Rock the Vote

Delhi recently voted for its members of parliament. This sparked a conversation at lunch about elections in India. Apparently people approach elections much differently here. What struck me most is that just about everyone at my table said that they don't vote.

Many of the educated youth in India are leaving their home states, which is a dramatic departure from how the country has historically operated. Getting back home is a hassle, a hassle that seems to be worth it to visit family, but not to vote. Especially, when you consider that voting means you'll have to wait at least two hours in a queue.

This seems the reverse of how it works in America. The educated tend to be in wealthier districts and thus have well funded voting stations. As a result, waiting times are dramatically lower. I know I spent about five minutes at the voting booth this year. But, those in poorer districts end up spending much more time waiting in queues. And they're exactly the ones who can't afford to take that time off. In India, where you have so many uneducated people with not much to do, waiting in line for a few hours seems irrelevant. It's the more privileged who can't afford to take time off of work to go wait in a line.

I asked them why they didn't vote absentee or change where they were registered. While both are possible, they're apparently very long and complicated processes. This seems to be mostly because the government doesn't track people well in India -- for example, there is no SSN -- so there are all of these extra hoops to ensure that if you change your voting information, you're not doing so fraudulently. I think it's also a reflection of the disorganization in their government.

But, people tended to lament the fact that they don't vote. It's just too difficult and not worth it. They just don't think it'll make a difference. A big part of this that there's a general perception that all politicians are corrupt here. They shared a bunch of stories. For example, there was this one education minister for the hometown of one co-worker. He bought all of this land and then encouraged these colleges to set up shop there. Once they did that and the value of the area sky rocketed, he sold the land and made a ton of money.

They also talked about this one good leader from Bihar. Bihar seems to be widely agreed upon as the worst state in India. This happens to be where most Indian politicians come from. Anyway, this lone non-corrupt leader had emerged from there. But, he was shot. Few other decent politicians have emerged.

In section 49.0-0 of the Indian constitution, there's a clause that gives citizens the right to not vote. There is a movement here that is advocating a policy change that counts these non votes as an objection to all candidates. If there are sufficient non votes, they want all candidates currently on the ballot to be removed and a new election be executed with a new set of choices. People seem to want this as it would provide an option to block corrupt leaders from getting elected. The problem is that no politicians want it so there's no way it'll get passed.

I think that America has got a lot of problems. Our electoral system is far from perfect in picking the best leader. But, I think we take for granted how well it actually works. Listening to my peers here in India talk about how they don't vote because they don't think it'll make a difference and it's not worth the hassle puts it into perspective. Especially this year.