Electoral Politics

Electoral Politics

Open Ended

Why do we need election?

Why do we need Election ?

• They can choose who will make laws for them.

• They can choose who will form the government and take major decisions.

• They can choose the party whose policies will guide the government and law making.

Open Ended

How do you distinguish between a democractic and non democractic election ?

Features of Democracy

Universal Adult Franchise : Everyone should be able to choose. This means that everyone should have one vote and every vote should have equal value.

Features of a Democractic Election

There should be something to choose from. Parties and candidates should be free to contest elections and should offer some real choice to the voters.

Features of a Democractic Election

 The choice should be offered at regular intervals. Elections must be held regularly after every few years.

Features of a Democractic election

 The candidate preferred by the people should get elected. 

Features of a Democratic Election

Elections should be conducted in a free and fair manner where people can choose as they really wish.

Open Ended

Do you think it is good to have political competition ? Give reasons for your answer

Electoral Competition - Demerits

Electoral competition has many demerits. It creates a sense of disunity and ‘factionalism’ in every locality. You would have heard of people complaining of ‘party-politics’ in your locality. Different political parties and leaders often level allegations against one another. Parties and candidates often use dirty tricks to win elections. Some people say that this pressure to win electoral fights does not allow sensible long-term policies to be formulated. Some good people who may wish to serve the country do not enter this arena. They do not like the idea of being dragged into unhealthy competition.

Electoral Competition - Merits

 Political leaders are rewarded for serving the people and punished for not doing so. Who decides this reward or punishment? The simple answer is: the people. This is what electoral competition does. Regular electoral competition provides incentives to political parties and leaders. They know that if they raise issues that people want to be raised, their popularity and chances of victory will increase in the next elections. But if they fail to satisfy the voters with their work they will not be able to win again.So if a political party is motivated only by desire to be in power, even then it will be forced to serve the people.

Multiple Choice

Which of the following statements about the reasons for conducting elections are false?

• Elections enable people to judge the performance of the government.

• People select the representative of their choice in an election.

• Elections enable people to evaluate the performance of the judiciary.

• People can indicate which policies they prefer.

Multiple Choice

Which of these is not a good reason to say that Indian elections are democratic?

• India has the largest number of voters in the world.

• India’s Election Commission is very powerful.

• In India, everyone above the age of 18 has a right to vote

• In India, the losing parties accept the electoral verdict.

Electoral Constitutencies

In our country we follow an area based system of representation. The country is divided into different areas for purposes of elections. These areas are called electoral constitutencies. The voters who live in an area elect one representative.For Lok Sabha elections, the country is divided into 543 constituencies. The representative elected from each constituency is called a Member of Parliament or an MP. One of the features of a democratic election is that every vote should have equal value. That is why our Constitution requires that each constituency should have a roughly equal population living within it.

Reserved Constituencies 

Open Ended

Do you think it is necessary to have reservation in the Lok Sabha? Give reasons for your choice

Justification for reservation

Our Constitution entitles every citizen to elect her/his representative and to be elected as a representative. The Constitution makers, however, were worried that in an open electoral competition, certain weaker sections may not stand a good chance to get elected to the Lok Sabha and the state Legislative Assemblies. They may not have the required resources, education and contacts to contest and win elections against others. Those who are influential and resourceful may prevent them from winning elections. If that happens, our Parliament and Assemblies would be deprived of the voice of a significant section of our population. That would make our democracy less representative and less democratic.

Amount of Reservation

Currently, in the Lok Sabha, 84 seats are reserved for the Scheduled Castes and 47 for the Scheduled Tribes (as on 26 January 2019). This number is in proportion to their share in the total population. Thus the reserved seats for SC and ST do not take away the legitimate share of any other social group.

Multiple Choice

Our country is divided into

• 500 constituencies

• 543 constituencies

• 550 constituencies

• 552 constituencies

Multiple Choice

What is meant by the term ‘constituency’?

• Place where the copy of constitution is kept

• A particular area from where voters elect a representative to the Lok Sabha / Vidhan Sabha

• A body of voters

• None of the above

Voters List

In our country, all the citizens aged 18 years and above can vote in an election. Every citizen has the right to vote, regardless of his or her caste, religion or gender. Some criminals and persons with unsound mind can be denied the right to vote, but only in rare situations. It is the responsibility of the government to get the names of all the eligible voters put on the voters’ list. As new persons attain voting age names are added to the voters’ list. Names of those who move out of a place or those who are dead are deleted. A complete revision of the list takes place every five years. This is done to ensure that it remains up to date

Election Identity Card

In the last few years a new system of Election Photo Identity Card [EPIC] has been introduced. The government has tried to give this card to every person on the voters list. The voters are required to carry this card when they go out to vote, so that no one can vote for someone else. But the card is not yet compulsory for voting. For voting, the voters can show many other proofs of identity like the ration card or the driving licence.

Multiple Choice

The list of those people who are eligible to vote is officially called

• Voter's List

• Electoral Roll

• Elector's List

• Constituency List

Multiple Choice

What is EVM?

• Electronic Voting Machine

• Machine Containing the names of Voters

• Elected Voting Member

• Election Voting Machine

Multiple Choice

The full form of EPIC is

• Election Photo identify card

• Electronic Photo identity card

• Electors photo identify card

• Electoral Photo identity card

Multiple Choice

The world Franchise means:

• Right to contest elections

• Right to hold public office

• Right to vote

• Right to criticise the government

Multiple Choice

The minimum age of exercising right to vote in India is

• 18

• 23

• 20

• 25

Nomination of Candidates

•  Anyone who can be a voter can also become a candidate in elections. The only difference is that in order to be a candidate the minimum age is 25 years, while it is only 18 years for being a voter. 

• There are some other restrictions on criminals etc. but these apply in very extreme cases.

• Political parties nominate their candidates who get the party symbol and support. Party’s nomination is often called party ‘ticket’.

• Every person who wishes to contest an election has to fill a ‘nomination form’ and give some money as ‘security deposit’.

Declaration

• Recently, a new system of declaration has been introduced on direction from the Supreme Court. Every candidate has to make a legal declaration, giving full details of

• Serious criminal cases pending against the candidate

• Details of the assets and liabilities of the candidate and his or her family

• Educational qualifications of the candidate

• This information has to be made public. This provides an opportunity to the voters to make their decision on the basis of the information provided by the candidates.

Open Ended

Why are the candidates required to give a detailed statement of their property?

Open Ended

Why there is no minimum Qualification required for running in Election in our country?

Educational qualifications for candidates

•  Even if education was relevant, it should be left to the people to decide how much importance they give to educational qualifications.

• In our countr y putting an educational qualification would go against the spirit of democracy for yet another reason. It would mean depriving a majority of the country’s citizens the right to contest elections. If, for example, a graduate degree like B.A., B.Com or B.Sc was made compulsory for candidates, more than 90 per cent of the citizens will become ineligible to contest elections.

Election Champaign

The main purpose of election is to give people a chance to choose the representatives, the government and the policies they prefer. Therefore it is necessary to have a free and open discussion about who is a better representative, which party will make a better government or what is a good policy. This is what happens during election campaigns. 

Election Champaign

In our country such campaigns take place for a two-week period between the announcement of the final list of candidates and the date of polling. During this period the candidates contact their voters, political leaders address election meetings and political parties mobilise tIn election campaigns, political parties try to focus public attention on some big issues. They want to attract the public to that issue and get them to vote for their party on that basis.heir supporters. This is also the period when newspapers and television news are full of election related stories and debates. But election campaign is not limited to these two weeks only. Political parties start preparing for elections months before they actually take place.

Open Ended

If a Lok Sabha Election was coing up this year , what according to you would be the important issues ?

 Election law

• Bribe or threaten voters

• Appeal to them in the name of caste or religion

• Use government resources for election campaign

• Spend more than ` 25 lakh in a constituency for a Lok Sabha election or `10 lakh in a constituency in an Assembly election

• If they do so, their election can be rejected by the court even after they have been declared elected. 

 Model Code of Conduct for election campaigns. 

•  Use any place of worship for election propaganda

• Use government vehicles, aircrafts and officials for elections

•  Once elections are announced, Ministers shall not lay foundation stones of any projects, take any big policy decisions or make any promises of providing public facilities.

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Multiple Choice

What are General Election?

• The election which are held in all the constituencies

• The elections which are held in some states

• The elections which held in one constituency

• The elections which are held due to the death of member of Lok Sabha

Polling and Countung Votes

• The final stage of an election is the day when the voters cast or ‘poll’ their vote. That day is usually called the election day. Every person whose name is on the voters’ list can go to a nearby ‘polling booth’, situated usually in a local school or a government office. Once the voter goes inside the booth, the election officials identify her, put a mark on her finger and allow her to cast her vote. An agent of each candidate is allowed to sit inside the polling booth and ensure that the voting takes place in a fair way. 

Electronic Voting Machine

Earlier the voters used to indicate who they wanted to vote for by putting a stamp on the ballot paper. A ballot paper is a sheet of paper on which the names of the contesting candidates along with party name and symbols are listed. Nowadays electronic voting machines (EVM) are used to record votes. The machine shows the names of the candidates and the party symbols. Independent candidates too have their own symbols, allotted by election commission. All that the voter has to do is to press the button against the name of the candidate she wants to give her vote.Once the polling is over, all the EVMs are sealed and taken to a secure place. A few days later, on a fixed date, all the EVMs from a constituency are opened and the votes secured by each candidate are counted. The agents of all candidates are present there to ensure that the counting is done properly.

Multiple Select

What is the details the candidates have to give in the legal declaration before contesting the elections?

• Serious criminal cases pending against them

• Educational qualification of the candidate

• Details of assets and liabilities of the candidate and his or her family

• All the above

Multiple Select

Recently In 2020 Their Are 245 Seats Occupied In Rajya Sabha

• True

• False

Multiple Select

Question-5- Which statement is true about the political leaders all over the world.

• (A) They want to remain in power or get power or position for themselves.

• (B) They want to promote Mechanical engineering .

• (C) Both A and D.

• (D) Political leaders like all the professions are motivated by a desire to advanced there career.

Multiple Select

----------- is required to give a detailed statement of there Property.

• (A) VOTERS

• (B) ELECTION COMMUNITY

• (C) CANDIDATES

• (D) Landless labours