■ Only four out of 6,753 candidates in the 2009 Lok
Sabha elections declared that they had spent more
than the limit of Rs 25 lakh on their election. The declared expenses of another 30 were between Rs 22.5-25
lakh (90-100%). The remaining, 6,719 said they had
spent between Rs 12 and 14 lakh (48-56%). Given the
large-scaleclamouraboutincreasedelectionexpenses
by political parties, and the general public perception
about how much is spent on elections, something
seems amiss, or to paraphrase Justice Markandey
Katju of the Supreme Court, and William Shakespeare, something seems to be wrong with the state of
politicsinIndia.
■ Acivil society organisationfiledanapplicationunder the Right to Information(RTI) Act,seeking copies
of income tax of political parties. The disclosure was
opposed tooth and nail by 17 political parties with seniorlawyers being brought into argue before the Central Information Commission (CIC), giving myriad
reasons such as the “competitive commercial interests” of the political parties concerned will be jeopardised if the income tax returns are disclosed to the
public.Thisiswhenpolitical partiesareallowed,and
claim, income tax exemption under the Income Tax
Act.That theCICdecidedtomakethereturnspublicis
anothermatter.
Between 20%and 30%of all MPs and MLAs in the
countryhavecriminal casespendingagainst them,in
which charges have been framed by the court of law.
W HATDOthe above have to do
with corruption? The answer may lie in the fact that
one simple explanation can
explain all the three: all political parties use unaccounted money. It may
become clear if we reframe the three examples
aboveintheformof questions.
Why should 99.4965% of the candidates contesting elections lie under oath while declaring their
election expenditure? Why should political parties
tryandhidetheirincomewhentheelectedrepresentatives, all of whombelong to the political establishment,havepassedalawthat political partieswillget
100%exemptionfromincometax?Whyshouldpolitical parties give their nominations to contest elections on their behalf, popularly called “tickets”, to
people who have criminal cases pending against
them, for cases which attract an imprisonment of
two years or more, and in which charges have been
framedbythecourt of law,whichisthethirdstagein
the criminal justice system—registration of an FIR
(theFirstInformationReport)beingthefirst,andfiling of the chargesheet in the court after investigationbythepolicebeingthesecond?
Thenthe questionarises, whydo political parties
use unaccounted money? This could even be generalisedto, whydoesanyone use unaccountedmoney?
An obvious answer is: when one is doing something
that one isnot supposedtodo. Political parties claim
theyhavetospendunaccountedmoneyonelections.
The reasongivenbypoliticiansandpolitical parties
forspendingunaccountedmoneyonelectionsisthat
thelimitlaiddownforexpenditureonelectionsistoo
low. This reason does not square with the fact that
99.5% of the candidates declare on oath that
they spend around 50% of the limit. How can this
anomalybeexplained?
For this we need to go to some fundamental questions such as: what is the purpose of elections, and
why do people want to win elections?The ostensible
reason given by an overwhelming majority of all aspirantsto a political “career” isthat they want to get
into politicsto do public service (samaj seva).Taken
at its face value, this would mean that people, who
want to contest elections, and want to win elections,
do that because they want to do “public service”.
This seems in conflict with widespread reports of
prospective candidates trying all kinds of stratagems to get nominated by the party of their choice,
including paying hefty sums of money to the party
coffers—most of it unaccounted. A news report a
couple of years ago that a substantial sum of cash
was stolen from the Delhi head office of one of the
leading parties and the party did not even lodge a reporttothepoliceseemsevidenceof this.
Recent experience of the last decade or so shows
that political partieshave ceased to be public service
organisations but have become election-winning
machines, the purpose of winning electionsbeing to
acquire power, and remain in power by any means
whatsoever.Thatexplainsgivingpartyticketstopeoplewithcriminalandotherdubiousbackgrounds, s o
long as they are rated high on “winnability”— the
twomainsourcesof winnabilitybeingmoneypower
andmusclepower.Agraphicexampleof moneypower came to light in a recent election in Tamil Nadu
where the Election Commission (EC) seized an ambulance full of currency notes doing the rounds in a
constituency the night before polling. It seems the
wordhadgonearoundthattheECwill seizeanyvehicle distributing money to voters and the candidate
thoughtanambulancewouldescapeattention!
If we look at all the instances that have come to
light in the recent months starting with the Commonwealth Games, the Adarsh episode, the telecom
scam,thechangesinlanduseandallotmentsof land
from the euphemistically called discretionary quota, all of them end up with the political establishment. Even earlier, the mining issue in Karnataka
and Andhra Pradesh and the spectacle of the Karnataka Lok Ayukta, Justice Santosh Hegde, resigning, taking back his resignation, and regretting it
later, shows that the basic cause of almost all
wrong-doing is the rapacious appetite for money in
thepolitical establishment.
The unholy nexus between
business and bureaucracy
would not have been
possible without the active
blessing, tacit approval and
willing involvement of the
political establishment
spiritual attainment, which, of course, is changing now. Since the
Thereisalsoagovernanceperspectivetopolitical
major, if not the sole, objective of
fundingbeingthefountainheadof corruptioninthe
country. Historically, business has not had a very
good reputation in traditional Indian thought because of the social disdain for making money, given
our earlier preoccupation with
business was considered to make money, it was generally felt that
businesswould,andcould,useanymeanswhatsoever to achieve that objective. In the so-called licence
and permit raj, it was felt that the bureaucracy was
exploitingthecontrolstomakemoneyforitself. This
entire phenomenon was referred to as the unholy
nexusbetweenbusinessandbureaucracy.What was
often missed was that none of this would have been
possible without the active blessing, tacit approval,
ment. This phenomenon has been explained by the
and willing involvement of the political establish
Law Commission of India in their 170th report in
1999inthefollowingwords:
“In the very scheme of things and as pointed out
by the Supreme Court in its various decisions, the
bulk of the funds contributed to political parties
would come only from business houses, corporate
groups and companies. Such a situation sends a
clear message from the political parties to big business houses and to powerful corporations that their
future financial well-being will depend upon the extent towhichtheyextendfinancial support tothepolitical party. Indeed most business houses already
know where their interest lies and they make their
contributions accordingly to that political party
which is likely to advance their interest more. Indeed not sure of knowing which party will come to
power, they very oftencontribute to all the major political parties. Very often these payments are made
inblackmoney”(Para4.1.6.1)(Emphasisadded).
The above should make it clear where it all
begins. The solution lies in making financial transparency in the working of political parties compulsory by law, for which internal democracy
in political parties is a necessary concomitant.
The LawCommissionof India has also recommendedthisin1995but,expectedly,thereportisgathering
dustwiththelawministry.
Thewriterisformerprofessor, dean,anddirector
in-chargeof IIM-A,andfoundingmemberof the
AssociationforDemocraticReformsand
National ElectionWatch