Suggestions on one nation, one election issue

(This article was submitted for consideration of the High-Level Committee under the Chairmanship of Shri Ram Nath Kovind, Former President of India. Some of the ideas given in this article were of my Guruji, Late Shri Chiruvolu Durgaprasada Rao, who sent a note on ‘Election Reforms’ in the early seventies to the then Prime Minister, Mrs. Indiara Gandhi. The note is not available now.)

Abstract

The government constituted a High-Level Committee (HLC) to examine the issue of simultaneous elections and make appropriate recommendations. Simultaneous elections were held on four occasions in the initial years after India became a Republic. Due to premature dissolutions and extension of terms of both the Lok Sabha and various State Legislative Assemblies over the years, the cycle has been disturbed. As of now, holding elections to Legislative Assemblies along with the elections to Lok Sabha in the first quarter of 2024 may be feasible only in respect of five States / UTs. As fixed or overhead costs will have to be incurred every time when elections are held and such costs will have to be incurred only once when elections are conducted in one go, the overall cost implications for conducting simultaneous elections are likely to be less.

Practices in other countries, 170^th report (1999) of the Law Commission and 79^th Report (2015) of the Parliamentary Standing Committee have provided some ideas for holding elections in one go. These sources seem to suggest mainly three-point criteria for achieving the goal, namely, fixing a common date for commencement of all legislatures, discouraging their premature dissolutions by introducing constructive no confidence motions and reconstituting legislatures after elections only for left-over tenures where premature dissolutions occur. The three-point criteria are either not feasible for implementation or may be undemocratic.

The third tier of legislature at the level of local bodies / tribal councils provides a feasible solution for the problem. Over 32 lakhs persons are elected directly by people at this level once in five years. Along with reservation for SCs and STs, there is a provision for vertical reservation of 33% for women at this level. Reservation for women can easily be escalated to the legislatures at national and State / UT levels. There cannot be a better representative electoral college than this to elect representatives for State Legislative Assemblies and the Lok Sabha.

The new election process will be highly peaceful and cost effective, as only over 32 lakhs elected representatives will be participating in place of over 94.5 crores voters to choose candidates for State level and national level legislative positions. The concerns enlisted for constituting HLC will either totally vanish or become less serious. Certain good practices and uniform standards can be introduced by law in respect of the elections to local bodies / councils, such that they commence from a common date, say 1^st July 2029. The State Election Commissions should be the only electoral authorities for elections for all the three tiers at that level and they should work under the overall supervision and control of the Election Commission of India. To give effect to the suggestions, twenty-nine amendments, that are only indicative but not exhaustive, to the existing laws, namely, the Constitution and five enactments, have been suggested. Two of these may require ratification by the States.

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1.       The Government of India constituted a High-Level Committee (HLC) on 02-09-2023 under the Chairmanship of Shri Ram Nath Kovind, Former President of India, to examine the issue of simultaneous elections and make appropriate recommendations. The concerns expressed in the Resolution constituting the Committee were: (1) holding frequent elections almost every year and at different times within a year, (2) incurring massive expenditure by the Government and other stakeholders in elections, (3) diversion of security forces and other electoral officers from their primary duties for significantly prolonged periods for conducting elections, and (4) disruption in developmental work on account of prolonged application of Model Code of Conduct (MCC) during election process. These are bare facts and hence, there may not be any difference of opinion on these concerns.

2.       While constituting the Committee, great reliance was placed by the Government on the 170^th Report (1999) of the Law Commission on ‘Reforms of the Electoral Laws’ and on the 79^th Report (2015) of the Department-related Parliamentary Standing Committee on Personnel, Public Grievances, Law and Justice on ‘Feasibility of Holding Simultaneous Election to the House of People (Lok Sabha) and State Legislative Assemblies’. The views of experts, public spirited persons, and political parties about the issue of simultaneous elections have been thoroughly examined in these reports.

3.       The basic provisions about the tenure of Lok Sabha and State / UT Legislative Assemblies and for conducting elections for them can be seen in Articles 83 (2), 172 (1), 85 (2) (b), and 174 (2) (b) of the Constitution. Under article 83 (2), the Lok Sabha will have a tenure of five years, which during Emergency may be extended for a maximum period of one year at a time and not extending beyond a period of six months after cessation of Emergency. As per article 85 (1), six months shall not intervene between the last sitting of Lok Sabha in one session and the date appointed for its first sitting in the next session. Under article 85 (2) (b), the President may dissolve the Lok Sabha. This may be a premature dissolution. Similar provisions exist in respect of State Legislative Assemblies under articles 172 (1), 174 (1) and 174 (2) (b) of the Constitution. If a State is brought under President’s Rule under Article 356, its Legislative Assembly may be prematurely dissolved by the President. But there is no provision in the Constitution to bring the entire nation under President’s Rule by dissolving Lok Sabha.

4.       In Parliamentary democracy, the tenure of a government usually coincides with the term of the Lower House (Lok Sabha) and it remains in power as long as it enjoys confidence of that House. The Government can fall any time with the passage of no-confidence motion in the Lok Sabha under rule 198 of Lok Sabha Rules after at least 50 Lok Sabha members support it. If it is passed, the council of Ministers must resign on moral grounds. In case an alternative Government cannot be formed, the Lok Sabha shall be dissolved, and elections must be declared. Thus, premature dissolution of Lok Sabha is possible through the passage of a no-confidence motion. Similar provisions exist in the case of State / UT Legislative Assemblies.

5.       Elections are held as and when required to choose members of the concerned legislatures for a fixed tenure of five years. The task of holding free and fair elections at regular intervals is assigned to the Election Commission of India (ECI) and State Election Commissions (SECs) under articles 324 and 243K / 243L of the Constitution, respectively. While the election to either Houses of the Parliament and either Houses or single House, as the case may be, of State / UT legislatures inter-alia is the main responsibility of the ECI, the election to local bodies (Panchayati Raj Institutions, Corporations / Municipalities, etc.) is vested with SECs.

6.       Out of the thirty-six States / UTs, eight States (Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Telangana and Uttar Pradesh) have bicameral legislature, the remaining twenty States (Assam, Gujarat, Kerala, Odisha, Punjab, Rajasthan, West Bengal, Nagaland, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Manipur, Tripura, Meghalaya, Sikkim, Mizoram, Arunachal Pradesh, Goa, Chattisgarh, Uttarakhand, Jharkhand) have unicameral legislature, three UTs (Delhi, Puducherry, Jammu and Kashmir) have unicameral legislature and the remaining five UTs (Andaman and Nicobar Islands, Lakshadweep, Dadra and Nagar Haveli and Daman and Diu, Chandigarh, Ladakh) are without legislature. Thus, there are thirty-one States / UTs, which have a Legislative Assembly for which direct elections are held from time to time as and when their tenure is completed. The issue under consideration is the feasibility of conducting elections simultaneously for the Lok Sabha and the Legislative Assemblies of thirty-one States / UTs.

7.       History indicates that simultaneous elections were held to the Lok Sabha and State Legislative Assemblies on four occasions in the initial years after India became a Republic, namely, in 1951-52, 1957, 1962 and 1967. Due to premature dissolution of some of the Legislative Assemblies in 1968 and 1969, and the Lok Sabha in 1970, the cycle of five years got disrupted. The term of the Fifth Lok Sabha was extended till 1977 under Article 352. The Sixth, Seventh, Ninth, Eleventh, Twelfth and Thirteenth Lok Sabhas were dissolved prematurely. Thus, there have been separate elections to Lok Sabha and State Legislative Assemblies due to premature dissolutions and extension of terms of both the Lok Sabha and various State Legislative Assemblies over the years because of which the cycle of simultaneous elections has been disturbed.

8.       Sections 14 and 15 of the Representation of People Act, 1951 laid down that notification for general election to the Lok Sabha or to a State Legislative Assembly shall not be issued earlier than six months prior to the date on which the duration of that House or Assembly would expire (otherwise than on dissolution). If the tenure of Legislative Assemblies or Lok Sabha are completed during one quarter of a year, normally elections would have been held in the previous quarter and MCC would have been under operation for about two to three months in the respective constituencies. The present Lok Sabha, namely, the 17^th Lok Sabha, was constituted in May 2019 and its tenure would be completed in May 2024. Elections to reconstitute it are likely to be held in the first quarter (Q1) of 2024. Assuming that election to the Legislative Assembly in the Union territory of Jammu and Kashmir (presently under President’s rule) would be held along with the general elections to Lok Sabha in Q1 of 2024, the details of completion of tenure of Legislative Assemblies and the period in which elections would be held are indicated below:

Names of States / UTs having Legislative Assembly	Tenure of Legislative Assembly ending in	Elections will be held during
Mizoram (1)	Q4 of 2023	Q3 of 2023
Chattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Telangana (4)	Q1 of 2024	Q4 of 2023
Andhra Pradesh, Arunachal Pradesh, Jammu & Kashmir, Odisha, Sikkim (5)	Q2 of 2024	Q1 of 2024
Haryana, Maharashtra (2)	Q4 of 2024	Q3 of 2024
Jharkhand, NCT Delhi (2)	Q1 of 2025	Q4 of 2024
Bihar (1)	Q4 of 2025	Q3 of 2025
Assam, Kerala, Puducherry, Tamil Nadu, West Bengal (5)	Q2 of 2026	Q1 of 2026
Goa, Manipur, Punjab, Uttarakhand (4)	Q1 of 2027	Q4 of 2026
Uttar Pradesh (1)	Q2 of 2027	Q1 of 2027
Gujarat (1)	Q4 of 2027	Q3 of 2027
Himachal Pradesh, Meghalaya, Nagaland, Tripura (4)	Q1 of 2028	Q4 of 2027
Karnataka (1)	Q2 of 2028	Q1 of 2028

9.       The above facts indicate that holding elections to State / UT Legislative Assemblies along with the elections to Lok Sabha in Q1 of 2024 may be feasible only in respect of five States / UTs, namely, Andhra Pradesh, Arunachal Pradesh, Jammu & Kashmir, Odisha, and Sikkim. In other cases, it may not be feasible, as of now. Thus, there seems to be no way by which the position of conducting simultaneous elections as in the initial years after independence could be restored in the present dispensation. Will it be possible in future and if so how, is an issue to be examined. Simultaneous elections cannot be held so long as the tenures of national legislature and sub-national legislatures from time to time vary or at times curtailed through no-confidence motions prematurely.

10.     Cost is also a main factor in elections. A substantial amount of money is spent by the Government for conducting elections. Almost five to six times more is spent by political parties and others in the elections and most of it is considered as black money. While the purpose of HLC is to examine the feasibility of conducting all the elections in one go, there are people who argue that, if possible, elections may be held every day, for the simple reason that it is the best way to bring out black money into circulation. Be that as it may, the Centre for Media Studies (CMS) Report on poll expenditure of 2019 elections brought out very interesting and startling revelations. The Report stated inter alia that:

• The 2019 general (Parliamentary) election in India emerges to be the most expensive election ever, anywhere.
• About Rs.60,000 crores were spent on elections in 2019, of which Government expenditure was about Rs.10,000 crores. On average nearly Rs.100 crores were spent for each Lok Sabha constituency.
• In 20 years, involving six elections to Lok Sabha between 1998 and 2019, the election expenditure had gone up by around six times.
• An estimated Rs 5,000 crores expenditure was incurred for the Assembly poll in Telangana in 2018.

11.     According to the ECI (para-6.2 of 79^th report of the Parliamentary Standing Committee), the cost of holding elections for the Lok Sabha and Legislative Assemblies of States / UTs would be Rs. 4,500 crores. Simultaneous conduct of elections would require large scale purchase of Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) and Voter Verifiable Paper Audit Trail (VVPAT) machines. For this purpose, the ECI estimated (para-7.1 of 79^th report of the Parliamentary Standing Committee) that a total of Rs. 9,284.15 crores would be needed for procurement of EVMs and VVPATs. Since the machines require replacement after every fifteen years, the cost of procurement recurs accordingly. Since the number of machines would be more than double the number that is maintained at present, maintenance and storage / warehousing costs would also go up.

12.     Clear estimates are not available on how much reduction in expenditure would be there, if we go for simultaneous elections. But whatever way the elections are held, it involves substantial expenditure. But by sheer common sense, one can understand that as fixed or overhead costs will have to be incurred every time when elections are held and such costs will have to be incurred only once when elections are conducted in one go, the overall cost for conducting simultaneous elections, although substantial, is likely to be less. But the moot question is whether an election, being the manner of expressing one’s opinion about suitability of a person for occupying a position, should be held with such a very heavy expenditure and is it worth it? Can we not find ways and means to channelize such expenditure for development work? No doubt, it is important to establish legislatures representative of the aspirations of the people, but the country need not spend scarce resources for the purpose.

13.     Apart from the cost angle, there are obvious disadvantages in conducting frequent elections. Disruption of normal public life and essential services, holding of rallies by political parties causing inconvenience to public and traffic, and deployment of manpower for election work will be seen repeatedly in frequent elections. Above all, imposing MCC for prolonged periods on several occasions hinders development work. If simultaneous elections are held, all these disadvantages will have to be borne only for a limited period. In view of the advantages in conducting simultaneous elections, its feasibility needs thorough examination, and a solution needs to be worked out within the parliamentary democratic norms.

Practices in other countries:

14.     There are a few countries where elections are held simultaneously at national and sub-national levels from time to time, which were referred to, in the reports of Law Commission and the Parliamentary Standing Committee. In South Africa, once in every five years elections to national as well as provincial legislatures are held simultaneously, and municipal elections are held two years thereafter. In Sweden, elections to national legislature, provincial legislature / county council and local bodies / municipal Assemblies are held on second Sunday in September once in every four years.

15.     United Kingdom was another example until recent times. The Fixed-term Parliaments Act, 2011 passed by the British Parliament laid down that elections would be held on the first Thursday of May every fifth year. The Act also provided for early elections when either of the following conditions is fulfilled:

16.     Although it was initially felt that the Fixed-term Parliaments Act provided some stability of tenure to the British Parliament, it resulted in chaos and constitutional deadlock in 2019. As a result, the Act was repealed in 2022 to restore the position that existed prior to its passage.

17.     The Federal Republic of Germany has a system of constructive vote of no-confidence by which a no-confidence motion would be accepted only along with a confidence motion. Article 67 of Basic law for Federal Republic of Germany is as follows:

Reports of expert committees

18.     In the 170^th Report of the Law Commission, the desirability of holding simultaneous elections was supported. Regarding assuring a fixed and unalterable term to Lok Sabha and the Legislative Assemblies, the Commission felt that the subject cannot be dealt with within the existing constitutional parameters and that it can be considered as and when a review of the Constitution is undertaken. While recognising the fact that the frequency of dissolution of State Legislative Assemblies under Article 356 has gone down drastically after the decision of Supreme Court in S.R. Bommai’s case, the Commission made the following suggestions:

“Holding of a separate election to a Legislative Assembly should be an exception and not the rule. The rule ought to be ‘one election once in five years for Lok Sabha and all the Legislative Assemblies’. Undoubtedly, the desired goal of one election in every five years cannot be achieved overnight in the given circumstances. It has to be achieved in stages. Adjustments may have to be made in future with a view to achieve the desired goal of one election for Lok Sabha and to all the Legislative Assemblies simultaneously. May be, a constitutional amendment can solve the problem. Such an amendment can also provide for extending or curtailing the term of one or more Legislative Assemblies, say for six months or so wherever it is necessary to achieve the said goal. However, if feasible, more appropriate solution may be to hold elections to Lok Sabha / Legislative Assemblies simultaneously but to withhold the results of elections till after the expiry of term of the Legislative Assembly concerned – the interval not exceeding six months.”

19.     Regarding the other alternative, namely, discouraging the passing of no-confidence motion which reduces the tenure of Lok Sabha or an Assembly, the Commission recommended to have constructive no-confidence motions as follows:

20.     In its 79^th Report, the Parliamentary Standing Committee mentioned its wide consultations on the issue of simultaneous elections. Some of the suggestions received by the Committee were as follows:

• Relevant Constitutional provisions may be amended to ensure that the term of the Lok Sabha would normally commence and expire on a particular date (and not on the date on which it completes five years from the date of its first sitting) and the period for general election to constitute new House would be so determined that the Lok Sabha could commence its term on the pre-determined date.

• To avoid premature dissolution, any ‘no-confidence motion’ moved against the government in office should also necessarily include a further ‘confidence motion’ in favour of a government to be headed by a named individual as the future Prime Minister and voting should take place for the two motions together.

• If dissolution of Lok Sabha cannot be avoided, then – (a) if the remainder of the term of the Lok Sabha is not long (period to be specified), there could be a provision for the President to carry out the administration of the country, on the aid and advice of his Council of Ministers to be appointed by him till the time the next House is constituted at the prescribed time; or (b) if the remainder of the term is long (period to be specified), then fresh election may be held and the term of the House in such case should be for the rest of what would have been the original term. In the Constitution of India, there is provision that a member elected in a bye election can hold office for the remaining period of term only, whether it is for the Rajya Sabha / Lok Sabha or for a Legislative Assembly. This principle should be applied to any reconstituted legislature after its premature dissolution. In case of premature dissolution of Assembles also, similar action may be taken.

• The term for the existing Legislative Assemblies will have to be either extended beyond five years or curtailed so that fresh elections can be held simultaneously with Lok Sabha election.

• If it is considered that uniform and synchronised term for Lok Sabha and Legislative Assemblies is not feasible, an alternative proposal would be to consider provisions to have all elections, falling due in a year together in a particular period of the year. In this arrangement, the advantage would be that the general elections to various Legislative Assemblies falling due in a year will be held together and not at different periods in the year. In the year in which the Lok Sabha election is due, all the Assembly elections of that year may also be held. This arrangement will also require certain amendments as well as extension or curtailment of the term of some of the Houses as a one-time measure.

• For holding simultaneous election, the tenure of Lok Sabha and State Legislative Assembly is to be fixed for five years. The experiment of House of Commons of United Kingdom in passing the Fixed-term Parliaments Act, 2011 has been referred to, where mid-term poll could be held only if two-thirds majority of House of Commons vote for fresh election, or an alternative Government is not formed within fourteen days.

• Elections to those Legislative Assemblies whose terms end six months prior to or six months after the term of the Lok Sabha, may be combined with the General Elections to Lok Sabha.

21.     Considering all the views and suggestions received by it, the Standing Committee felt that simultaneous election in every fifth year can be held in near future but slowly it would reach in stages for which tenure of some of the State Legislative Assemblies need to be curtailed or extended. Extension of term of Legislature is not permissible except under proclamation of emergency. But elections to Lok Sabha / State Legislative Assemblies can be held six months before under Sections 14 & 15 of the Representation of People Act, 1951.

22.     The Committee also recommended an alternative and practicable method of holding simultaneous elections which involves conducting elections in two phases. The Committee has envisaged holding elections of some Legislative Assemblies at midterm of Lok Sabha and remaining with the end of tenure of Lok Sabha with the proposed first phase to be held in November 2016 and the second phase in 2019 along with the General Elections to Lok Sabha. The Committee recommended that elections to all State Assemblies whose terms end prior to or after a time period of six months to one year from the appointed election date can be clubbed together and the terms of some State Legislative Assemblies may need to be extended while some of them may need to be curtailed. Under Sections 14 and 15 of Representation of People Act, 1951, ECI can notify the elections to Lok Sabha and State Legislative Assemblies six months prior to the end of their natural terms, respectively. The Committee felt that this provision may be used to hold elections without extension of terms of some Assemblies.

23.     The Committee while taking note of the provisions of the Fixed Term Parliaments Act, 2011, of The United Kingdom, recommended that early election to Lok Sabha and State Legislative Assemblies can only be held prior to expiration of their tenure, where either of the following two conditions are met: –

24.     The Committee further recommended that bye elections to all seats falling vacant in a particular year be conducted together on a pre-determined date / time frame. The Committee was conscious of the fact that holding simultaneous elections may not be feasible in 2016 or even in a decade but it expressed confidence that a solution will be found to reduce the frequency of elections which relieve people and government machinery being tired of frequent electoral processes.

Conclusions on the reports of expert committees

25.     The reports of the expert committees and international practices seem to suggest mainly the following three-point criteria for achieving the goal of simultaneous elections:

26.     Criterion (1) could have been easily provided for, when the Constitution was adopted, by fixing a uniform date of commencement, say 1^st of May 1952, for the Lok Sabha and all the State / UT legislatures in the Constitution itself. Having not done so, fixing a uniform date of commencement for all the legislatures at this juncture is not possible without extending or curtailing the tenure of a few. Elections being a very costly affair nowadays, the option of curtailing tenures of legislatures will not be welcome, particularly by those who are in power. Extending tenures will be possible only under the proclamation of emergency and in the normal course, it will not be preferred by the parties not in power. The Fixed-term Parliaments Act, 2011, which was relied upon by the Standing Committee in 2015 has been subsequently repealed by the British Parliament in 2022. Hence, the model may not work in India as well.

27.     The second criterion of constructive no confidence motion seems to be against the spirit of democracy and the Westminster model of Parliament. The Government must have the confidence of concerned legislature and no restrictions can be imposed on this requirement either through prescribing a minimum period for two consecutive no confidence motions or by making a successful no confidence motion conditional upon providing an alternative. The onus shall be on the ruling party to prove its strength in the legislature. This obligation cannot be shifted to parties not in power either to prove or disprove it. However, the efforts of opposition parties who are ready to make a no-confidence motion successful cannot be rendered nugatory only because they are not ready with a confidence motion in favour of an alternative person. Hence, constructive no confidence motion seems to be against democratic norms.

28.     The third criterion, namely, conducting an election after premature dissolution of a legislature to re-constitute it only for the left-over tenure may not be favoured by political parties, who along with the exchequer incur huge expenditure for elections. The expenditure incurred by political parties remains the same irrespective of tenure and hence, the political parties have no reason to support or be satisfied with partial tenure. Making a provision of bringing Governor’s rule or President’s rule even for shorter periods after premature dissolution of legislature will not in any way help in conducting simultaneous elections. If the provision is for longer periods, it may be misused by the party in power.

29.     The suggestion of the Standing Committee to conduct elections in two phases, one at mid-term of Lok Sabha and the other at the end of tenure of Lok Sabha, also suffers from similar problems. In cases where elections are held early and outcomes are declared immediately, which result in the party in power losing in the elections, it would be improper for it to continue in power despite having a further tenure of a few more months. Hence, early elections may not be favoured. If declaration of elections is held up till the tenure of legislature is completed, it may result in extending the applicability of MCC, which is not desirable. At times, if there is anti-incumbency, the Government will face the wrath of the opposition forcing them to resign and get the election results declared.  Hence, extending or curtailing tenures of legislatures either to make them reconstituted on a fixed day or for any other reason or introducing Governor’s rule or President’s rule even for shorter periods are not going to be feasible propositions. In any case, conducting elections prior to their normal schedule and not declaring results till the usual time will force Governments to work as lame duck Governments till election results are declared. This serves no purpose.

30.     Amid anxiety to establish a mechanism to conduct simultaneous elections, one should not do anything or introduce any amendments to laws which hits at the basic roots of democracy. The suggestions available in the Law Commission report and Standing Committee report are not feasible for implementation without disturbing the democratic norms in the present dispensation.

Way forward

31.     India has a system of democratic decentralization in its three-tier system of governance with very clear vertical division of subjects to be handled at each level. Direct elections are held for the three levels of legislature, the first one for Lok Sabha, second one for legislative assemblies and the third one at the level of local bodies / tribal councils. Conducting elections to all the Lok Sabha constituencies on one day, is possible, if resources needed for the purpose are made available. In other words, it is feasible under the present legal dispensation. However, the 2019 Lok Sabha elections were held in seven phases, may be due to resource constraints or may be due to the requirement of deploying security forces from one place to the other or may be due to both. There would be similar constraints in holding simultaneous elections for legislative assemblies. However, as of now, without extending or curtailing the tenure of some of them, it would not be possible to conduct elections to all the assemblies in one go. Thus, holding simultaneous elections for the first two levels of legislature is not possible due to resource constraints and tenure issues, as the afore-mentioned three-point criteria are either not feasible for implementation at the National and State levels or may be undemocratic.

32.     Interestingly, the third tier of legislature provides a feasible solution for the problem under consideration. It facilitates evolving a cost-effective and highly peaceful election process, in which the concerns enlisted for constituting HLC either totally vanish or become less serious. The Constitution (Seventy-third Amendment) Act, 1992 (w.e.f. 24-04-1993), which inserted Part-IX (Articles 243 to 243-O) in respect of Panchayats, and the Constitution (Seventy-fourth Amendment) Act, 1992 (w.e.f. 01-06-1993), which inserted Part IXA (Articles 243P to 243ZG) in respect of urban local bodies called ‘Municipalities’, to the Constitution provided for a very strong grass root level third tier of governance. This tier provides a viable alternative and ample opportunities to solve the problem under consideration.

33.     Part-IX of the Constitution provides for composition of Panchayats in rural areas in such a way that the ratio between the population of a Panchayat and the number of seats in such Panchayat to be filled by election shall be, more or less, the same throughout the State. All the seats in a Panchayat shall be filled by persons chosen by direct election from territorial constituencies in it and, for this purpose, each Panchayat area shall be divided into territorial constituencies in such manner that the ratio between the population of each constituency and the number of seats allotted to it shall be, more or less, the same throughout the Panchayat area. Number of seats reserved for SCs and STs shall, by and large, bear the same proportion to the total number of seats to be filled by direct election in that Panchayat as the population of the SCs or of the STs in that Panchayat area bears to the total population of that area and such seats may be allotted by rotation to different constituencies in it. There is also vertical reservation for women not exceeding one-third of the total number of seats. The Legislature of a State may provide for reservation of seats in favour of backward classes. Every Panchayat, unless sooner dissolved, shall continue for five years from the date appointed for its first meeting. An election to constitute a Panchayat shall be completed before the expiry of its duration of five years or before the expiration of a period of six months from the date of its dissolution provided that where the remainder of the period for which the dissolved Panchayat would have continued is less than six months, it shall not be necessary to hold any election for reconstituting the Panchayat for such period. A Panchayat constituted upon its premature dissolution shall continue only for the remainder of the period for which the dissolved Panchayat would have continued had it not been so dissolved. Similar provisions exist in respect of urban local bodies called ‘Municipalities’ under Part IXA of the Constitution.

34.     Under article 243K, the job of conducting elections to the Panchayats in each State is vested in the SEC consisting of a State Election Commissioner to be appointed by the concerned Governor. Under article 243L, a similar provision applies to Union territories.

35.     The above provisions indicate that the third criterion in the three-point criteria is already provided for, for the local bodies. This facilitates fixing a date of commencement for all the local bodies for the future. Taking into consideration the likely immediate opposition for this idea, the date of commencement may be proposed at least five years later, say on 1^st July 2029 (beginning of agricultural year) and as a one-time measure, it would be possible to conduct future elections of local bodies in such a way that the tenure of those bodies which cannot complete their five year tenure in the normal course by 30-06-2029 shall be terminated by that date and direct elections shall be held well in advance such that all the local bodies commence on 1^st July 2029. Once the first and the third criteria are satisfied, there may not be a requirement for the fulfilment of the second criterion at such a grassroot level as a local body. However, even fulfilling the first and third criterion is not a condition precedent for the solution to the current issue.

36.     Parts IX and IXA of the Constitution are not applicable to certain Scheduled and Tribal areas in the country as laid down under articles 243M and 243ZC. For these areas, the Fifth and Sixth Schedules of the Constitution are applicable as per article 244. Under these Schedules, appropriate provisions exist for directly electing representatives for the autonomous States, district councils, and regional councils with a tenure of five years or with a tenure of residual periods in case of dissolutions in the interim.

37.     Parts IX and IXA read with articles 243M and 243ZC and the Fifth and Sixth Schedules provide for representatives getting directly elected in the respective territorial constituencies. Over 32 lakhs persons are elected directly by people in this manner once in five years. Apart from the usual provision of reservation for SCs and STs, there is a provision for vertical reservation of 33% for women in these seats. There cannot be a better representative electoral college than this to elect representatives for State Legislative Assemblies and the Lok Sabha.

38.     There are 4,669 (543 + 4126) elected representatives in the Lok Sabha (543) and the thirty-one State / UT Legislatures (4,126). If these representatives get elected by the 32 lakhs elected representatives, as and when there is a requirement, it solves many problems. In fact, there may not be a need to elect all the 4,126 representatives for Assemblies at a time or electing them along with 543 Lok Sabha representatives, as the concerns expressed in conducting separate elections may not be relevant in respect of the proposed electoral college of 32 lakhs elected representatives. The elected representatives of the local bodies / councils falling under a constituency (Lok Sabha or State / UT Legislature) will elect a representative for the constituency. If the person elected is a sitting member of the local body / council, upon his election to the Lok Sabha or a State Legislature, his position shall be deemed to have been vacated in the local body / council and accordingly election shall be conducted for the vacant seat in the local body / council.

39.     Certain good practices can be introduced in respect of elections and bye elections to be held to local bodies / councils. As a good practice, arrangements can be made in such a way that the first criterion (of the three-point criteria) gets fulfilled in respect of all the local bodies / councils. That means, there can be simultaneous elections at local body / council level throughout the country. Such simultaneous elections can be conducted only during a period convenient to the whole country, to be called “election period”, say during 1^st of June to 15^th of June once in five years and elections can be notified well in advance accordingly. It is possible to fix the tenure of five years for the local bodies / councils to commence from a common date, say 1^st July 2029, and conduct elections simultaneously. Bye elections, where necessary, may also be scheduled during the election period every year and for this purpose seats which have fallen vacant during January to May and seats which are likely to fall vacant during June to December of that year can be considered. In all other situations, as and when seats fall vacant, elections can be conducted only during the next election period. Another good practice could be to reduce expenditure substantially on direct elections at this level by incentivizing each territorial constituency going for a unanimous election (without contest) with sanction of an amount equivalent to the likely election cost at that level for development expenditure of the constituency. If there is a provision or a practice of choosing representatives from different occupational classes / groups rather than caste groups, such representation would be highly progressive at the grassroot level. This election process will have many advantages, some of which are indicated below:

(1) The election process will be very peaceful, as only over 32 lakhs elected representatives will be participating in these elections to choose candidates for State level and national level legislative positions. There are 94,50,25,694 voters in the country as on 01-01-2023. As on today, the number might have gone up. Thus, in the normal course, each representative of an Assembly would be elected by about 2.3 lakh voters (94,50,25,694 / 4,126) and each representative of Lok Sabha would be elected by about 17.4 lakh voters (94,50,25,694 / 543) while in the proposed election process, each Assembly representative would be elected by about 775 persons (32,00,000 / 4,126) and each representative of Lok Sabha would be elected by about 5,893 persons (32,00,000 / 543) on average. Since the 32 lakhs voters (reduced by 295 times compared to the total electoral roll) will be distributed throughout the country, the election can be conducted institutionally in the offices of the local bodies / councils. There may not be a need to conduct simultaneous elections for the State level or national level legislative positions, as the concerns expressed for such elections will vanish or become less serious once the electoral college is changed on the above lines to have indirect elections. However, in the case of elections to local bodies / councils, people will continue to directly participate.

(2 The election process will be highly cost effective. There won’t be a need to spend huge number of resources (money, manpower, security forces etc.) for conducting elections for State / national level legislative positions. The contestants or their sponsors / political parties also need not spend as much money as they have been spending for elections now a days. In fact, there may not be any need for imposing MCC for State / national level elections. However, MCC may continue to apply in local body / council elections.

(3) Constitution provides for State level Commissions to conduct elections to local bodies. Since the representatives elected in this process will in turn have to elect representatives for State and national level under the new proposal, such elections may also be conducted by State level Commissions under the overall supervision of the ECI. It paves the way for setting certain standards for delimitation of constituencies for local bodies / councils across the country, for laying down uniform service conditions for State level Election Commissioners, for setting uniform expenditure limits for elections and for implementing reservation and its rotation of seats in an equitable manner.

(4) Under the new dispensation, one may even visualize a party-less democracy and a political system free from mobocracy. Politics and administration will eventually become issue based. Excessive groupism, lack of internal democracy in political parties, highly biased and one-sided attitude, and nepotism, somewhat encouraged and promoted by the anti-defection law (Tenth Schedule of the Constitution), which are the vices in the present system, may not be required or patronized in the proposed system. In fact, the phrase “political party”, which was not used in the Constitution prior to 01-03-1985, has been introduced for the first time when the Tenth Schedule (Anti defection law) was inserted in the Constitution vide the 52^nd Constitution Amendment Act, 1985 which came into effect on 01-03-1985. It was also subsequently used in the 91^st Constitution Amendment Act, 2003 which came into effect on 01-01-2004. Such references to political parties and the Tenth Schedule may not be required anymore in the Constitution.

(5) Political parties being criticised for issuing tickets to highest bidders to contest elections on party symbol in different constituencies and after elections for indulging in horse trading for government formation may not be seen in the proposed new dispensation.

(6) At present, the local bodies / councils have not been receiving the attention that they deserve in allocation of funds, in conducting elections regularly and in functional decentralization. This scenario will undergo a sea change in the new dispensation. The local bodies / councils will draw adequate attention and respect from policy makers through their representatives. Representatives elected at State / national level with their familiarity with grassroot level institutions will be able to perform better. If representatives of local bodies are elected at the State / national level, their grassroot level experience will come handy in exercising their role at a higher level.

(7) If electoral colleges are formed with representatives of local bodies / councils to elect representatives at State / national level, the performance of the representatives so elected may be continuously watched / monitored by the respective electoral colleges. In case the performance or conduct of any elected representative is considered unbecoming of a representative or not up to the mark, it is possible to provide for recalling the person and electing another person in his place for the rest of the tenure of the legislature. The proposed new dispensation will have this advantage because of the manageable size of the electoral college. This puts a check on the elected representatives at State / national level and on their behaviour of blindly and illogically following the line of a leadership.  Hence, they would be very careful as their performance would be under constant observation by their voters.

(8) Gender bias, which is presently attributed to legislatures at State / national level, may be addressed to some extent in the proposed dispensation, as local bodies / councils have at least 33 % representation of women and hence, they are expected to elect good number of women at higher levels. It would be easy to escalate the provision of 33 % vertical reservation for women to the legislatures at national and State / UT levels, which is currently being deliberated in the Parliament vide the Constitution (One Hundred Twenty-eighth Amendment) Bill, 2023.

(9) Above all, there would be no requirement of separate polling booths for the new election process, as the offices of local bodies / councils could safely be used for the purpose on election days. Public rallies, hanging posters and cutouts everywhere, and other publicity measures by contestants may be wholly disallowed in the new election process and addressing elected representatives by them in the offices of local bodies / councils on the days permitted for the purpose and distributing manifesto or any printed / written material to the voters in the offices with prior notice may only be allowed. This insulates the public totally from electoral restrictions. There would be no requirement of declaring a holiday to offices, schools, and other institutions on the election day, except for the offices of local bodies / councils where elections are held.

Challenges

40.     If everything goes well with the election processes at the local body / council level, then that will undoubtedly provide a solution for the issue under examination. But unfortunately, all is not well at that level. Although constitutional provisions make elections to the local bodies / councils mandatory, they are not held regularly at present. Issues such as reservations and delimitation are stated to be the reasons for postponement. Under articles 243K and 243ZA of the Constitution, the responsibility for the conduct of elections which includes all preparatory steps such as preparation of electoral rolls, delimitation, reservation, rotation, and related matters have been vested with SECs, but in some cases the State Governments have been exercising some of these functions. Uniform guidelines for the delimitation work such as parity in the ratio between the population of a territorial constituency and the number of seats within the same class of panchayats or municipalities are needed, and this requires certain standardization and well-defined extent of permissible variations at national level. Even under the Constitution, parity is stipulated in the proviso to article 243C for Panchayats, but it is missing in article 243R in respect of municipalities. Provisions in respect of reservations for SCs, STs, OBCs and women, rotation and its frequency, and delimitation under articles 243D and 243T must be made uniform across all States / UTs. Qualifications and disqualifications of representatives also require standardization at national level. Service conditions of State Election Commissioners also vary across States / UTs. To address these issues comprehensively, there is a need for a comprehensive law for local bodies / councils very similar to the Representation of the People Act, 1950 and the Representation of the People Act, 1951.

41.     The third tier of governance, being a highly representative system of democratic governance in the country with over 32 lakhs elected representatives of the people, requires more standardization across all States / UTs in respect of election process. The starting point is to amend the Constitution to provide for broad qualifications for the position of a State Election Commissioner and uniform service conditions to be prescribed by Parliament by law for the position. The SEC should be the only electoral authority at the State level for elections for all the three tiers and it should work under the overall supervision and control of the ECI. This arrangement will be beneficial to the ECI and the SECs in supporting each other in their autonomous functioning and in sharing knowledge, expertise, and resources. It will also pave the way to establish a well-knit integrated system of electoral authorities.

Amendments required

42.     To give effect to the proposals stated above, amendments required to the existing laws, that are only indicative but not exhaustive, are given below:

S. No.	Name of the law	Relevant clause (s)	Gist of the amendment
1	Constitution	Article 81 (1) (a) & Article 170 (1)	The words “chosen by direct election from territorial constituencies in the States” shall be replaced in an appropriate way to prescribe indirect election by elected representatives of local bodies / councils.
2	Constitution	Articles 75 (1B), 102 (2), 164 (1B), 191 (2), 361B & Explanation (a) below it, and the Tenth Schedule	Tenth Schedule shall be omitted and references to it in the articles shall also be omitted by appropriate amendments.
3	Constitution	Article 239AA (2) (a)	The words “chosen by direct election from territorial constituencies in the National Capital Territory” shall be replaced in an appropriate way to prescribe indirect election by elected representatives of local bodies / councils.
4	Constitution	Article 243C	After clause (2), a clause may be inserted to provide for special grant to each constituency, where a contesting candidate was declared elected unanimously and the amount of grant shall be equal to the likely expenditure to be incurred by the exchequer had the election not been unanimous, as may be determined by the State Election Commission. The amount received as special grant shall be spent exclusively for the development of the constituency.
5	Constitution	Article 243K	Provisions on State Election Commissioner shall be amended to provide for appointment by President and service conditions to be laid by law by Parliament.
6	Constitution	Article 243R	After clause (1), a clause may be inserted to provide for special grant to each constituency, where a contesting candidate was declared elected unanimously and the amount of grant shall be equal to the likely expenditure to be incurred by the exchequer had the election not been unanimous, as may be determined by the State Election Commission. The amount received as special grant shall be spent exclusively for the development of the constituency.
7	Constitution	Clause (4) of article 324	Provision for appointment of State Election Commissioners for conducting local body elections shall be included.
8	Constitution	Clause (5) of article 324	Provision for service conditions of State Election Commissioners shall be included.
9	Constitution	Article 325	The words “one general electoral roll” shall be replaced in an appropriate way to bring in the electoral college comprising elected representatives of local bodies / councils.
10	Constitution	Sixth Schedule	Appropriate provisions may be added for special grant to each constituency in the elections to Councils, where a contesting candidate was declared elected unanimously and the amount of grant shall be equal to the likely expenditure to be incurred by the exchequer had the election not been unanimous, as may be determined by the State Election Commission. The amount received as special grant shall be spent exclusively for the development of the constituency.
11	Constitution	Article 326	This may be omitted, as it may not be required anymore.
12	Constitution	Article 327	Appropriate enabling provisions may be inserted to enact a law by Parliament for elections to local bodies / councils on the lines of the Representation of the People Act, 1950 and the Representation of the People Act, 1951, and for recall of elected representatives of Lok Sabha and State Legislative Assemblies.
13	Constitution	Entry 72 of List I – Union List of the Seventh Schedule	This should be substituted by: “Elections to Parliament, to the Legislatures of States, to the local self-governments and to the offices of President and Vice-President; Election Commission at national level and sub-national level; Delimitation of territorial constituencies for conducting elections.”
14	Constitution	Entry 37 of List II – State List of the Seventh Schedule	This should be substituted by: “Elections to the Legislature of the State and local self-governments subject to the provisions of any law made by Parliament.”
15	Goa, Daman and Diu Reorganisation Act, 1987	Section 12	The words “chosen by direct election from assembly constituencies” shall be replaced in an appropriate way to prescribe indirect election by elected representatives of local bodies / councils.
16	Jammu and Kashmir Reorganisation Act, 2019	Sub-section (3) of section 14	The words “chosen by direct election” shall be replaced in an appropriate way to prescribe indirect election by elected representatives of local bodies / councils.
17	Government of Union Territories Act, 1963	Sub-section (2) of section 3	The words “chosen by direct election” shall be replaced in an appropriate way to prescribe indirect election by elected representatives of local bodies / councils.
18	Representation of the People Act, 1950	Sub-section (2) of section 4	The words “chosen by direct election from parliamentary constituencies in the States” shall be replaced in an appropriate way to prescribe indirect election by elected representatives of local bodies / councils.
19	Representation of the People Act, 1950	Sub-section (1) of section 7	The words “chosen by direct election from Assembly Constituencies” shall be replaced in an appropriate way to prescribe indirect election by elected representatives of local bodies / councils.
20	Representation of the People Act, 1950	Clause (b) Sub-section (1) of section 7	The words “chosen by direct election from assembly constituencies” shall be replaced in an appropriate way to prescribe indirect election by elected representatives of local bodies / councils.
21	Representation of the People Act, 1950	Sub-section (1A) of section 7	The words “chosen by direct election from assembly constituencies” shall be replaced in an appropriate way to prescribe indirect election by elected representatives of local bodies / councils.
22	Representation of the People Act, 1950	Sub-section (1) of section 7A	The words “chosen by direct election from Assembly Constituencies” shall be replaced in an appropriate way to prescribe indirect election by elected representatives of local bodies / councils.
23	Representation of the People Act, 1950	Section 19	The words “electoral roll for that constituency” shall be substituted by “electoral roll for that territorial constituency of the Panchayat or Municipality or Council, as the case may be”.
24	Representation of the People Act, 1951	Sections 4, 5 and 5A	Appropriate provisions may be made for reservation of seats for women and other backward classes.
25	Representation of the People Act, 1951	Section 25	This may be amended to declare offices of local bodies / councils as polling stations.
26	Representation of the People Act, 1951	Section 26	This may be amended to disallow elected representatives of local bodies / councils as polling stations from performing election duties.
27	Representation of the People Act, 1951	Section 39A	This may be amended to disallow all kinds of publicity except addressing elected representatives by contestants in the offices of local bodies / councils on the days allowed for the purpose and distributing manifesto or any printed / written material to the voters in the offices with prior notice.
28	Representation of the People Act, 1951	Section 53	A sub-section may be inserted to provide for special grant to each constituency, where a contesting candidate was declared elected unanimously and the amount of grant shall be equal to the likely expenditure to be incurred by the exchequer had the election not been unanimous, as may be determined by the State Election Commission. The amount received as special grant shall be spent exclusively for the development of the constituency.
29	Representation of the People Act, 1951	Section 62	This may be amended appropriately to make the electoral college comprising only elected representatives of local bodies / councils in a constituency.

43.     As per the proviso under clause (2) of article 368 of the Constitution, certain amendments to the Constitution require not only the passing by each House of Parliament but also ratification by at least half of the States as well. Amendments given above at s. nos. 13 and 14 may fall under this category.