Feasibility of India’s electoral system

Abstract

The choice of an electoral system is one of the most important institutional decisions taken in a democracy and is responsible for shaping the country‟s political future. Electoral systems today are viewed as powerful and influential political means to decide the course of policies, issues of governance, representation and composition of elected assemblies. The best electoral system is said to be one which accurately reflects the preferences of its voters. However, there is no clear definition as to which electoral system fits the criteria. Today, there is much debate about how electoral systems have affected the representation in legislatures and consequently in the executive of various nations. In the Indian context, there has been a disparity between the vote share and seat share in the past few Lok Sabha elections.The 2014 Indian Lok Sabha (the lower house of the Indian bicameral legislature) elections spurred a discussion regarding the deficiencies of the first-past-the-post (FPTP) electoral system. In FPTP there is little to negligible correlation between a party‟s vote share and the number of seats it wins. In March 2015, the Law Commission of India stated that a different electoral system that would proportionally represent the population should be considered. It is important to consider that some of the biggest and most powerful democracies in the world such as the UK and the United States of America use the FPTP, given its ease in conducting processes among other advantages. However, each of the electoral systems has their own merits and proves to be successful in certain social and economic structures. With India possessing a distinct societal structure, the question that arises is whether a change in the current practice is needed and if at all it is changed, which of the electoral systems would bring out the true meaning of democracy. Before we delve into the various kinds of electoral systems and their feasibility, we have broadly looked at some of the reasons why elections matter and the importance of elections in establishing a true democracy