Hello, everyone. Good morning, afternoon or evening, and welcome to this edition of Notes from South Asia. You can find all the articles in the series here (along with my other diaries).
You may have heard the news. The Modi and BJP bulldozer was stopped in its tracks before it destroyed the good parts of Indian constitution and the country. Naturally, people have thoughts on the subject and we will read some of that in this piece. We will also cover oppression of youth in Pakistan and politicians seeking postponement of elections in Sri Lanka.
India
India stops BJP in Their tracks
As you may already know—since Western papers covered the subject—for the first time in a decade—and first time ever for Modi in an election he contested—the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) failed to get a majority in the Indian people’s house, the Lok Sabha, where the members are directly elected through an election conducted across India every five years. The main national level opposition party, the Indian National Congress (INC) is seeing a resurgence though there is still a long way to go.
Here is a news report from Press Trust of India published in the Hindu.
The Election Commission of India has declared results for all Lok Sabha constituencies, with the BJP winning 240 of the 543 seats and the Congress 99.
The last result to be announced was that of Beed constituency in Maharashtra, where NCP (Sharad Pawar) candidate Bajrang Manohar Sonwane defeated the BJP's Pankaja Munde by 6,553 votes.
While the Lok Sabha has 543 members, counting was held for 542 seats after the BJP's Surat candidate Mukesh Dalal was elected unopposed.
The BJP candidate in Surat was elected unopposed after the Election Commission of India (ECI) rejected the INC candidate’s nomination papers. That is just one of the tricks that the ECI and the government used against the opposition in this election.
The INDIA alliance won 234 seats while the National Democratic Alliance of BJP won 292 seats. (For whatever reason, The Hindu has not included All India Trinamool Congress (AITC) in the alliance in their graphic I linked, which is why the number shows 205 and not 234. AITC is part of the INDIA alliance.)
An independent Member of Parliament (MP) from Maharashtra—who had left INC before elections to contest as independent because the nomination went to an alliance partner—has expressed unconditional support for INC as well. So, the INC count may go up to 100 (or 101 since another independent in Bihar gave support too).
All right, now that you have the figures, let us go for the analysis.
WHO or What Stopped NDA and Arrested India’s Slide into Autocracy?
As per the analysis based just on vote share, there was a swing across Hindi Speaking North India away from BJP. We will know more about it in the coming days.
The Hindu published Lokniti-CSDS survey that shows a small swing for INDIA across the country and demographics, with BJP still dominant. It may be true but I think country-wise surveys do not give the extent of regional variations and the reasons for the change.
Yamini Aiyar and Neelanjan Sircar (both scholars of democracy) write for the Hindu about what Indians were thinking while they voted against BJP.
Yamini Aiyar will be a Visiting Senior Fellow at Brown University in 2024-25. Neelanjan Sircar is Senior Fellow, Centre for Policy Research
For so many years, the BJP has sought to defend itself against concerns of democratic erosion by pointing to the electoral support it receives. In this way, the BJP constructed its “democratic legitimacy” from its extraordinary performance in elections. But, democratic legitimacy is not about just winning elections. It is about winning fair elections. In the run-up to the elections, two Opposition Chief Ministers were jailed and countless important Opposition political leaders had to fight against investigative agencies or the tax department. The once-hallowed Election Commission of India (ECI) seemingly acted in a partisan manner in not censuring the Prime Minister and others for blatant violations of the Model Code of Conduct. The traditional media often refused to cover the campaign of the Opposition parties and concerns. This fed into the perception that elections were meant to be a foregone conclusion, a performative exercise.
I heard this myself from a cousin (and many people in news reports). What is the point of voting? Isn’t it already rigged in favour of one party?
It crossed a red line. The political theorist Robert Dahl argued that democracies require the citizens, as a whole, to be able to choose between all political actors and parties — that they can essentially compete on equal footing. Of course, all of this can be hard to measure. But in principle, there should be an “equality of opportunity” for all viewpoints and all political actors to be heard. It may be hard to define, but it is easy to spot when this equality is missing. This is why political theorist Adam Przeworski noted that a “minimal condition” of democracy is that political “alternation” is plausible, i.e., the ruling party loses from time to time.
People seem to have felt that the country is headed towards authoritarianism even if they articulated it in other ways.
While this might seem like high-minded theory, these concerns express themselves in myriad ways. In Uttar Pradesh, the Dalit community, in particular, expressed concerns that the Constitution might change. Elsewhere, we heard complaints about the BJP “washing machine” — the use of investigative agencies to coerce popular politicians to defect to the BJP. In the South, many we spoke to expressed a fear that the federal bargain was being compromised, and that their linguistic identities were at risk. These may all sound like specific issues, but their root cause is the same — excessive coercion and manipulation of institutions from the ruling party.
Other anxieties about democratic erosion were also visible. Apart from the Constitution entering the realm of mass politics, voters recognising the extent of total media control, had turned to social media in search for alternative narratives, others spoke of fear (only after a lot of trust building, necessary to break the sullen silence) and still others of tanaasahi (dictatorship). Together, it was these issues that pushed the electoral discourse as it travelled through the seven phases. The sole campaigner, Narendra Modi repeatedly found himself on the back foot, deploying deeply polarising and divisive rhetoric and ad hominem attacks on the Congress Party to counter these claims.
The campaign was thus both a reflection and response to voter discontent emerging, in part, from the visible concerns over the democratic legitimacy of the BJP. To the extent that there was a “national issue” in this election, it was framed around concerns of democratic erosion — concerns that cut through, in different ways, across the country. Even those who were committed to voting for Mr. Modi and the BJP expressed a discomfort with the unbridled misuse of power. The election was framed by the BJP as a fait accompli. There were no demands that citizens could bring to their leaders, no issues upon which they could hold them accountable. Prime Minister Modi’s third term was inevitable.
The opposition read the voter fears correctly and managed to tap into it.
As the campaign unfolded, this demand for accountability returned, albeit partially to the electoral process. When we spoke to voters about the electoral process, many expressed concerns about the lack of fairness in the process. The debate on electronic voting machine (EVM) manipulation, regardless of the truth, had percolated into the chatter in the rural hinterlands. It was this frustration and growing de-legitimisation of the BJP’s democratic credentials that, to the Opposition’s credit, it was able to harness, ultimately declaring this as the election to battle for the Constitution. The fact that the BJP had to spend a large part of the last two phases of the election reassuring the population that it would not change the Constitution, suggested that bottom-up feedback mechanisms were indeed working. Even concerns from farmers’ protest, that had moved outside of the formal, democratic process, eventually found their way into the electoral arena. The BJP sustained some of its heaviest losses in the States of Haryana, Rajasthan, and Uttar Pradesh that had been touched by the protests.
What the article authors above deduced through anecdotal data, the Hindustan Times reporter Dhrubo Jyoti confirms through an analysis of the pattern of wins.
Note: SC seats are seats reserved for Scheduled Caste groups (that is, Dalits—former untouchable caste groups). ST seats are seats reserved for Scheduled Tribes or Adivasis. General seats are seats where there is no reservation and anyone can stand for election.
From data analysed by HT, there were two takeaways. One, the BJP had slipped in SC seats. Of the 84, it won 46 in 2019 and only 29 in 2024. Its median vote share dropped from 50.76% to 45% and strike rate from 73% to 42%.
Two, the BJP did worse among SC seats than general or seats reserved for tribals. In general seats, its strike rate was at 56% and tribal seats 59%, compared to 42% for SC seats – a fact that experts attributed to fears around the Constitution hurting the BJP. [...]
The snowballing anxiety among Dalit groups over the impact of the BJP’s hegemony first emanated in the cramped bylanes of Dalit-dominated neighbourhoods in small towns such as Nagina, Robertsganj or Machhlishahr and was soon picked up by the Opposition. Congress chief Mallikarjun Kharge, himself hailing from a Dalit community, stressed on the possibility in rally after rally and his party colleague Rahul Gandhi started carrying a pocket Constitution to all his events to underline his adherence to India’s founding book.
The BJP, especially Prime Minister Narendra Modi and home minister Amit Shah, first tried to counter this groundswell by repeatedly saying they had no intention of changing the Constitution. After the first phase of elections, they shifted to the offensive by using sharp language laced with faith-based dogma – alleging that it’s not the BJP that was looking to syphon away quotas from Dalits, Adivasis and backwards, it was the Congress. And worse still, it had done so in states such as Karnataka and given it to Muslims.
The INDIA bloc chose to not engage. Instead, it pivoted away from its promises of a nationwide caste census and doing away with the 50% cap on reservations towards the language of protecting the Constitution, a perceptible nod to anxieties emanating from the ground and an implicit admission that while important, explaining the complicated link between a caste census and constitutional rights (or jobs) was tougher than using the far simpler (and more emotive) image of the Constitution.
The Constitution came to encapsulate the aspirations and concerns of Dalit people to whom reservations are the only ladder to a life of dignity and constitutional protections against violence and untouchability the only bulwark against social oppression. In meetings, Dalit candidates such as Azad and Jatav spoke not only about Dr BR Ambedkar and dignity, but also the need for laws to protect Dalits against violence and the importance of the fast-disappearing government jobs.
Not just that but the INDIA alliance also made their candidate nominations more inclusive. For example, in Maharashtra, Congress fielded a Dalit candidate (or more, but one won) from a general seat—that is a seat not reserved for them. This is rare.
Likewise, its alliance partner Samajwadi Party (SP) fielded Dalits from general seats in Uttar Pradesh (UP). The SP spoke of an alliance of OBCs, Dalits and minoritised people (Muslims). both INC and SP worked with each other in campaigning in UP where the BJP saw its biggest upset. Well in numbers. In proportion, I’d say Haryana, Rajasthan and Maharashtra were similar jolts.
The different alliance partners worked well there too. It appears people did not appreciate all the party splitting and coups that BJP organised in Maharashtra.
They lost seats in Karnataka as well (though the person I voted for did not win; Bangalore went full BJP ;-/).
This does not mean unemployment and poverty did not matter. It was just that voters connected those issues directly with BJP’s high handedness (or dictatorship as they called it). Plus, it is possible that Hindu nationalism and voter polarisation may have hit a plateau.
Fatima Khan reports for the Quint that Modi lost 47% of the seats where he campaigned this election compared to fifteen percent last election. Most interestingly, he lost the seats where he had made specific anti-Muslim comments. They were directed at Dalits, OBCs and Adivasis but as the Hindustan Times article notes, Dalits were not impressed.
This by the way does not mean that the threat of Hindu nationalism is no longer there. It is still there but people, especially the poorer sections, are taken with other concerns (Shoaib Dainyal for India Fix, Scroll).
The problem for the BJP, however, is that by itself this segment of the population is not enough to construct an electoral plurality. The Indian Union is so huge and diverse that even at its peak, Hindutva is only one of the issues at play in a national election.
Take the Ram Mandir in Ayodhya. Built on the site of a mosque demolished by a Hindutva mob, the temple is the centerpiece of Hindutva and the single most important reason for the BJP’s rise to national prominence. In January, Modi inaugurated the temple in the manner of a mediaeval Hindu sovereign, with images of this merger of state and faith being broadcast across India.
In spite of this, the BJP lost the very constituency in which the temple is situated. A ground report by my colleague Supriya Sharma found that in Faizabad, many Dalit votes were not based on the Ram temple but on more mundane issues: caste-based reservations and the stray cows that had proliferated because of the laws banning beef. Even though many had voted BJP in the past, the decision was based on another bread-and-butter issue: free rations.
Likewise, the Citizenship Amendment Act that was brought in to get more Hindu votes did not increase BJP vote share in West Bengal. BJP lost seats there compared to 2019.
If BJP was truly an egalitarian Hindu party, I believe most of the non-Muslims will vote for them. Such is the present state of our society.
But there is no egalitarianism in fascism. Not even a limited one.
Majoritarian Violence and Elections
I had noted in a previous piece that Kashmiris turned out to vote in numbers not seen since decades this election. Why did they? And what does their vote say about the state of Kashmir? Gowhar Geelani writes for Kashmir Times that the vote was a clear rejection of Delhi’s agenda.
Not one, but many factors were at play in Kashmir’s dicey political landscape after the changes made in August 2019. Kashmir continues to remain a valley of versions and a graveyard of reputations.
Major takeaways from the results of the just-concluded parliamentary elections in Jammu and Kashmir are:
The massive and unprecedented defeats to the two former chief ministers – Omar Abdullah of the National Conference (NC) and Mehbooba Mufti of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP).
Two, embarrassing electoral setbacks to the Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) proxy trio comprising Sajad Lone, Altaf Bukhari, and Ghulam Nabi Azad, who lead the lesser-known faction of the People’s Conference (PC), Apni Party (AP), and the Democratic Progressive Azad Party (DPAP) respectively. On all three seats in the Kashmir Valley – Srinagar, Anantnag-Rajouri, and Baramulla – the election results come as a rude shock for the BJP allies. All candidates representing the AP, PC, and DPAP tasted bitter defeats.
Besides these two defining factors, the thumping wins for incarcerated politician Sheikh Abdul Rashid, popularly known as Engineer Rashid, senior NC leaders Mian Altaf Ahmad Larvi and Agha Syed Ruhullah Mehdi signal a change in the mindset of voters, especially the first-time voters, and women.
Take the case of Engineer Rashid’s spectacular electoral victory in the Baramulla Lok Sabha constituency. In the absence of resources and a cadre base, his victory is significant in more ways than one. It is a vote for resilience and against the status quo. It is a result of the anger against the BJP proxies in north Kashmir and the political and dynastic elite with a proven anti-people track record. Moreover, Rashid rode on a sympathy wave.
He is Engineer Rashid.
Engineer Rashid currently in Jail wins from Baramulla, Kashmir. He was the librarian of Jail 4. Mr. Rasheed was very very helpful to me during my stay in jail. He would convey my messages to my Lawyer and to family whenever I was taken from one district of UP to another, This is when I was not allowed to speak to them. He would regularly come down my ward to enquire about me almost every 2 days. So so happy for Mr. Rashid.
Mohammed Zubair is part of a fact checking platform called Altnews that has done a lot to arrest spread of disinformation in India. He was jailed on a spurious case some time back—based on a tweet of his. He got out after a couple of weeks. He is talking about that experience.
Back to the article.
In 2024, there is a clear message that the voters will not shy away from placing faith in the non-dynastic political faces if the old dynasts refuse to mend their ways and continue to take people for granted. Furthermore, whatever the BJP has tried to undermine or promote in Kashmir since 2019 has been duly vetoed by the voters.
Shakir Mir writes for the Quint that the BJP’s policies have only deepened soft separatism in Kashmir.
“Kashmiris have always looked for an anti-India hero,” said a journalist from Kupwara town in North Kashmir, describing the popular frenzy that the independent candidate Abdul Rashid Sheikh, also known as Engineer Rashid, whipped up in his constituency of Baramulla, which has now culminated in an emphatic victory for the jailed politician. "Today, when the street protests were banned, they latched on to Engineer Rashid.”
Confirmed on 4 June, Rashid’s triumph in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections has come at a huge cost to his high-profile rival, the former J&K Chief Minister Omar Abdullah, who has been defeated by an astronomical margin of 2,04,000 votes.
A construction engineer-turned-politician, Rashid champions maximum autonomy for Kashmir as well as the preservation of the region's Muslim identity.
The article though suggests that the traditional parties—National Conference (NC) and People’s Democratic Party (PDP)—did have wins too even if their former chief ministers lost.
Like Kashmir, Manipur also rejected BJP. I have not yet seen a proper analysis. Abhinay Lakshman reports for the Hindu.
The people of Manipur voted out the BJP and its ally, the Naga People’s Front, from the Inner and Outer Manipur constituencies, respectively, leading to comfortable victories for the Congress candidates in these seats in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, which was held in the backdrop of the ongoing ethnic conflict between the Valley-based Meiteis and Hills-based Scheduled Tribe Kuki-Zo people.
The Congress’s Alfred Kanngam Arthur won the Outer Manipur (ST) seat by a margin of over 83,000 votes. The party’s choice of fielding Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) professor A. Bimol Akoijam in the Inner Manipur seat paid-off handsomely, with Mr. Akoijam beating the BJP’s Th. Basantakumar Singh, a State Minister, with a margin of over 1.09 lakh votes.
While the Inner Manipur seat is dominated by voters from the Meitei community and comprises most of the valley districts of the State, the Outer Manipur seat is largely dominated by the Kuki-Zo tribal communities and the Naga tribes with some valley districts also coming under the seat.
That is, Congress won both Meitei constituency and Kuki-Zo constituency with 47% vote share.
Following the results, apex bodies of Kuki-Zo tribes and civil society organisations like the Zo United and the Indigenous Tribal Leaders’ Forum (ITLF) called it a “positive” outcome.
I guess, I should stop here though there is much more analysis—state by state—and there is a lot to be said.
Pakistan
Pm Sharif and China
The Prime Minister, Mr. Shehbaz Sharif has promised to pursue Chinese development model for the country reports Syed Irfan Raza.
ISLAMABAD: Appreciating the Chinese development model, Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif said on Thursday Pakistan can become a great nation if it followed that model through hard work and focus on industrial and agricultural growth.
“All Pakistanis will also have to pass through this thorny process. There is no other way to earn respect in the world,” the prime minister said at the 4th Pakistan-China Friendship and Business Reception in Beijing.
Earlier, PM Shehbaz met the Chairman of China International Cooperation Agency, Ambassador Luo Zhaohui and exchanged views on promotion of cooperation driven by common development, strategic trust and mutual benefit.
The prime minister appreciated the CIDCA’s support for CPEC projects and establishment of Pakistan-China Friendship Hospital, the Desalination Plant in Gwadar, and the New Gwadar International Airport. They expressed confidence that the momentum would continue in the CPEC phase II.
Imran Ayub writes about government efforts to save Karachi from flooding for the Dawn.
KARACHI: To deal with more than “normal rainfall” which is expected this monsoon, the city administration came together on Thursday and decided in a meeting to clean 586 drains and clear over 310 choking points across Karachi.
According to Meteorological department and National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA), the heavy downpour would mainly affect the southern parts of Sindh.
After the advisory and warning issues by the National Emergency Operation Centre (NEOC), Met office and the NDMA, the city administration held a meeting with Sindh Chief Secretary Syed Asif Hyder Shah to discuss the arrangements for the upcoming monsoon rains, wherein he sought details of preparations done so far and discussed ways for effective operation of the departments concerned during the rains.
Pakistan and Its Youth
Faisal Bari writes for the Dawn that Pakistan is no country for the young.
A STUDENT is expelled for bringing a rubab to the university hostel and playing it. A university in Lahore expels two students when they embrace each other after one of them proposed to the other publicly. Baloch students get harassed and picked up every so often from various universities across the country.
Policing what students wear, especially females, is common on many campuses. Women are told they cannot wear jeans or tights, etc. Some universities even have rules on how close men and women can come when they are talking to each other. Student unions continue to be illegal.
What are young people supposed to do? How are they supposed to get ready for life after university if we are not going to allow them to talk to each other, interact with each other, be responsible for what they wear (they are over 18 and adults by all definitions), and have confidence in themselves and their choices?
It is okay for these young people to get married and have children and to vote once they turn 18, but it is not okay for them to talk to the other gender or decide how much distance to keep from others or what to wear!
As soon as it comes to women’s dress, people ask: are you saying we should allow people to wear whatever they want? What if someone comes to university scantily clad or in very revealing clothes? But have we seen a lot of women walking around on Pakistani campuses dressed like this? Pakistan already has decency laws. They should apply to campuses as well. Why should there be separate laws for university campuses?
It is not about clothes, poetry or music. It is about policing. It is about the fact that we do not trust young people and we are afraid of young people. And by we, I mean we as a collective — especially the elites and people who have power and privilege. Of all constituencies, it is the young who have the potential to shake existing power structures. But that can only happen if the youth are organised, if they have spaces to reflect on what they stand for, what they want and how they wish to go about achieving it. The power holders are afraid of exactly this.
Pakistan is a young country. The 2017 population census showed that 40.31 per cent of our population was under 15 years of age, and another 19.19pc between 15 and 24 years. Almost 60pc of the population, therefore, was under 24 years of age. This country should be for young people; it should work to ensure that the youth, the future of this country, get every opportunity to develop. But our fear of young people and their potential makes us want to control them.
Pakistan High Court Acquits Imran Khan in Cipher Case
Press Trust of India (PTI) reports for the Hindu that Imran Khan was acquitted in the cipher case.
In a major relief for Imran Khan, a top Pakistani court on June 3 acquitted the beleaguered former Prime Minister as well as his Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi in the cipher case.
Mr. Khan, the founder of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party was sentenced to 10 years of imprisonment along with Mr. Qureshi in the cipher case in January by Islamabad’s special court set up under the Official Secrets Act.
The cipher case pertains to the incident in which the former premier showed a piece of paper — allegedly a copy of a diplomatic communication — at a public rally in Islamabad, claiming it as proof of a conspiracy against his government by a foreign power, referring to U.S. diplomat Donald Lu, who has been at the centre of the cipher controversy.
Mr. Khan had brandished the cipher paper just two weeks before the ouster of the PTI government in April 2022 through a vote of no-confidence in Parliament.
Both Mr. Khan and Mr. Qureshi had challenged the verdict in the Islamabad High Court.
Following the hearing of their pleas on Monday, Islamabad High Court suspended their sentence and ordered that they be released if not wanted in any other case.
He was acquitted on another two cases as well.
A Pakistani court on June 4 acquitted jailed former Prime Minister Imran Khan and other top leaders of his party in two cases related to vandalism during an anti-government protest march in 2022.
The 71-year-old Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party founder has been in jail since August last year after being convicted in some of the nearly 200 cases slapped on him since his ouster in April 2022.
The district and sessions court of Islamabad acquitted Mr. Khan, former Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi, ex-Communication Minister Murad Saeed, and other PTI leaders in two cases of vandalism during the 'Haqeeqi Azaadi' march, the Express Tribune newspaper reported.
Of course, he continues to be in jail in for other cases.
Sri Lanka
Postponing Elections
Jayampathi Wickramaratne writes for the Colombo Telegraph about United National Party Secretary’s statement that Sri Lanka’s elections must be posponed for two years.
United National Party Secretary Range Bandara’s statement at a media briefing at UNP Headquarters that the terms of the current President and current Parliament should be extended by two years ‘to save the Nation’ has drawn the ire of the people at large, with even the UNP’s ally (for the moment?), the Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna distancing itself from the proposal. The essence of the people’s response is that the present Parliament has lost its legitimacy, and President Wickremesinghe has been elected not by the People directly but by that very Parliament for the remainder of the term of President Gotabhaya Rajapaksa, who was forced to resign.
An amendment of the Constitution ordinarily requires a two-thirds majority in Parliament. Article 83 provides that a Bill for the amendment or the repeal or replacement of or which is inconsistent with any of the provisions of Articles 1 (The State), 2 (Unitary State), 3 (Sovereignty of the People), 6 (National Flag), 7 (National Anthem), 8 (National Day), 9 (Buddhism), 10 (Freedom of thought, conscience and religion), 11 (Freedom from torture) and Article 83 itself and also a Bill which seeks to extend the term of office of the President or the duration of Parliament to over six years, would become law only if it is passed by a two-thirds majority in Parliament and is approved by the People at a referendum.
It has been argued that since the proposal is to extend the terms of the current President and Parliament to seven years, it can only be passed with a two-thirds majority in Parliament and approval at a referendum. It follows from the argument that a referendum would not be needed if the terms are to be extended to six years only.
The writer takes a different view, namely that the terms of an existing Parliament and a President-in-office cannot be extended even with the approval of the People at a referendum as they were elected for a specific term. Such an extension would go against the spirit of the Constitution. As the Lawyers Collective pointed out last week, a two-thirds majority of Parliament and a 50%-plus-One majority of the People cannot just pass ANY amendment.
Jehan Perera writes for the Colombo Telegraph that economic consolidation needs no referendum. He says that the UNP secretary’s statement regarding postponing elections is akin to a trial balloon.
Government leaders appear to be considering all options for remaining in office beyond the constitutionally mandated periods of five years for the presidency and parliament. UNP General Secretary Palitha Range Bandara has announced that the government is considering postponing both the presidential and general elections for two years. There has been a considerable amount of speculation about a possible postponement of elections. In fact, this has been a part of the political discussion for over a year. The justification given for the effective freezing of politics until economic revival is assured is the need to consolidate the gains of economic recovery and prevent reversal. The assumption underlying this argument is that the present government is best suited for the job and their track record bears this out.
Two years ago, people spilled out onto the streets to demand the resignation of the former president and government because of the intolerable economic situation. They wanted a new government that would restore their economic situation. This is still to happen and there is pent up frustration in society and demand for change that is bubbling beneath the surface. Recently there was a news report that a leading business conglomerate had grown by over 400 percent in the first four months of this year. But statistics on malnutrition and poverty continue their negative plunge. Public opinion polls show the government lagging in a distant third place behind the two main opposition parties. The disturbing call for a postponement of elections by two years arises in these circumstances where it appears that the government fears the verdict of the masses of people.
There is concern that the government is systematically increasing the powers available to law enforcement agencies to restrict civic space and quell dissent. The way in which the government is persisting in its use of the much criticized Prevention of Terrorism Act, and now the new Online Safety law which gives it the power to close the democratic space for dissent through the social media bodes ill for the future. The proposed Anti-Terrorism Act, Broadcasting Authority Act and NGO Act which are in the pipeline would give government-appointed decision makers the power to decide whether trade union action and political opinion can be subject to punitive measures even on spurious grounds of causing harm to national sovereignty and public order in the country.
Both provincial and local government elections have already been postponed and are long overdue which violates democratic principles and the rights of people. In these fraught circumstances, and with decisive presidential elections around the corner, the announcement by the UNP General Secretary that the government is considering postponing both the presidential and general elections for two years is akin to a “trial balloon” being floated on this matter. A “trial balloon” refers to a preliminary or tentative proposal or idea that is floated to gauge public reaction or interest before committing to a full-fledged plan or course of action.
That is it for today. Until next Friday, everyone. Stay safe. Be well. Take care.
May egalitarian constitutional democracy win everywhere. Rather may people win the rights of democracy and peace and justice everywhere.