Right to reject will change our electoral politics

The wheels are turning. Suddenly the empire seems less mighty. There were two extraordinary events this week. After a nine year court battle, the Supreme Court allowed voters to 'reject all' candidates in an election if they so wanted, calling it their fundamental right to do so and a few hours later, Rahul Gandhi dismissed the ordinance promulgated by his own government to shield convicted legislators as a piece of “nonsense.” Was it a sudden change of heart or strong public opinion which brought on these theatrics on his part Many called it a calculated move or a desperate attempt to save the day. Whatever be the reason, both his public outrage and the Supreme Court verdict point to a substantial shift in the mindset of our polity. Public opinion is becoming difficult to ignore for politicians as they can no longer control it, thanks to democratisation of the media, the reach of the internet and social media. Crowd sourcing and dissemination of opinion through the new medium is gathering critical mass. This is good news for our democracy and will eventually lead to electoral reforms. The Right to Reject is bound to have long term implications. Imagine a situation where a winner gets less votes than the “reject all” option. He will still be declared winner under our existing laws, but will have no moral authority to call himself the people’s representative as the majority will have rejected him. It is a matter of time before we see new laws mandating a re-election in such a scenario. Surveys show that many more people are likely to go to polling booths just to register their protest now that they have the opportunity to do so. Imagine the fear of “all being rejected” in the traditional political class. It has competition now, no longer providing the only players in the fray with new generation political parties gathering momentum and having a realistic chance at making a difference now. This will force parties to make a conscious effort to identify better candidates. All this will not happen overnight but then every reform does take time. Remember the days of booth capturing and ballot box stuffing by gunmen before Mr T. N. Seshan cleaned up the electoral process and EVMs defined our elections The same EVMs will once again change our electoral democracy providing voters a new button to “reject all.” Change, it appears is here to stay. The writer is the founding member of Nav Bharat Democratic Party