Hits and misses in the one nation, one election idea

Targeted reforms of the electoral process can preserve the strengths of India’s vibrant, multi-level democracy

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Over the past decade, the Narendra Modi government has embraced a series of “One Nation” policies aimed at replacing India’s diverse patchwork of state-specific policies with uniform, national schemes. From the Goods and Services Tax (“One Nation, One Tax”) to the portability of subsidised rations (“One Nation, One Ration Card”), the impulse has been toward centralisation and standardisation.

Now, the government is pursuing one of the most controversial of these projects: One nation, one election. This proposal seeks to replace India’s staggered electoral calendar with simultaneous elections for the Lok Sabha and all state assemblies. The idea has featured in Modi’s speeches for years but was given a boost in March 2024, when a high-level committee headed by former President Ram Nath Kovind endorsed the idea. In December, the government introduced the Constitution (129th Amendment Bill to give the Election Commission of India (ECI) the authority to implement such a system. The Bill is currently being reviewed by a joint parliamentary committee.

Modi and his BJP colleagues have long argued that frequent polls disrupt governance, drain resources, and induce short-term populism. India’s current electoral calendar ensures that some part of the country is almost always in campaign mode. Proponents argue that constant elections constitute an undue burden on the State’s coffers. And the Model Code of Conduct (MCC) —an informal set of norms to ensure a level-playing field during the cam-

paign period —is cited as a source of “policy paralysis”. There is obvious appeal to aligning India’s staggered election calendar, but there are less disruptive, less dramatic solutions to the underlying problems the government wishes to solve.