Political scientist Ashwini Kumar.
nistula hebbar talks political scientist Ashwini KumarCo-editor of the book “Migrants, Mobility and Citizenship in India” on the Election Commission’s decision to explore remote voting for migrants…
Q. The decision of the Election Commission of India (ECI) to start the process of enabling migrant workers to vote remotely in polling in their home states has focused attention on this category of invisible voters. What is the extent of internal migration in India and its contours?
A: The decision of the Election Commission to enable expatriates Especially short term, migrant workers are going to be historic in making India a more inclusive, participatory and vibrant democracy. The political marginalization of migrants in India, largely due to bureaucratic barriers, is serious and debilitating. This has not only resulted in what we call the phenomenon of ‘virtual dispossession’ of migrants, but has also given rise to a massive ‘citizenship deficit’ as dalits, adivasis and extremely backward castes form the bulk of the country’s poor and working classes . Diaspora in India.
According to the 2011 census, there are over 450 million migrants – which is 37% of the population. Given the general increase in the demographic pattern in India, this number has increased by about 580 million since the last census. But there’s a big catch here. The political marginalization of migrants is also due to methodological and policy flaws because government data gathering systems do not capture what we call “seasonal migrants/communication migrants/short term” migrants. Based on triangulated sources including NSSO and micro-studies, we estimate the number of short term/seasonal migrants at 200 million to 250 million – the most exploited, most deprived citizens who are at the core of the hordes of jobless hungry migrants back home Were. COVID-19 crisis.
Also read: Explained | Will expatriates be able to vote remotely?
Q. What has been the extent of political engagement of this category of population?
A. Interstate migrants make up up to 40% of the population of cities such as Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, Bangalore and Surat, but migrants especially short-term migrant workers are a highly discontented segment in elections as registration and voting rates are disproportionately low among urban . Migrants. We all know that ‘Mati ke Lal’ politicians, last-mile electoral officials’ animosity, corruption and classism plague India’s voter registration system. For example, in 2014, only 65% of recent migrants to Delhi had voter ID cards, allowing them to vote in city elections, compared to an overall average of 85% of Delhi’s residents. Also, empirical studies suggest that the average processing time for new voter registration should be 150 days for middle-class Delhi residents and 331 days for the city’s slum dwellers.
Political scientist Tariq Thachil (2017) found in a sample of Delhi construction workers that only one in five migrants had ever voted in city elections. And it will surprise you. According to our TISS study on ‘Inclusive Elections in India’ sponsored by the Election Commission of India, between 60% and 83% of domestic migrants have failed to vote in at least one national, state or local election. in the destinations. Although ‘Sons of Soil’ challenges have decreased significantly, fear of electoral backlash from constituents prevents political parties from granting voting rights to migrants – this weakens the incentive for them to provide constituency services – The root cause of the lack of political incentive to vote.
Read also: Opposition divided over remote voting machines for migrants
Q. Will the technology enable such voting with legitimacy?
A. By using additional protocols like VVPAT, the ECI has effectively handled the critics of EVM. Compliance with the provisions of secret ballot, and remote voting linked to Aadhaar cards will encourage migrant workers to vote outside the constituencies in which they are registered. As shown in the case of EVMs, this technology will further reduce the possibility of electoral identity fraud and related electoral malpractices. Don’t forget that this also has the potential to improve/increase migrant registration rates and significantly skew election results. For example, micro-studies show that ‘ease of voting’ – such as providing at-home assistance with completing and submitting voter registration documents – increases migrant registration rates by 24 percentage points and 20 percentage points in the next election. does. It also changes downstream outcomes, raising political interest and perceptions of local political accountability. To enhance the validity of the new technology, it is imperative for the ECI to develop a robust national data set by identifying short-term/seasonal migrants. More than technology, the success of remote voting lies in widespread political acceptance of the social benefits of migrant voting.
Q. What do you think will be the impact of this in terms of party system, electoral patterns and political activity in India?
A: In view of this landmark decision of the ECI, we expect that the electoral power of inter-state migrants is likely to increase in the coming decades. Pre-election surveys suggest that the migrant factor makes a difference to a respondent’s voting choices as migrants are more likely to consider the performance of the central government than that of the state government, even during state elections. So expect fluidity in election results in the future. In terms of election turn out, we expect voter turn out in cities. Studies have shown that ‘missing migrant voters’ have resulted in low voter turnout in major metro cities. And remote voting can be a game changer in increasing voting turn out, especially women voter turn out in elections.
In other words, remote voting can help reduce structural constraints on rural women’s spatial mobility and political engagement. Political parties will be encouraged to include migrants in formal organizational positions and will also be encouraged to nominate migrants as candidates from migrant-dense constituencies. And national political parties like the BJP and the Congress party, and their regional allies, with varying degrees of success, are likely to strategically mobilize migrants in the local population without jeopardizing their core constituencies. There are also some unintended benefits of extending voting rights to migrants in terms of preferences for more ‘programmatic welfare politics’ and greater inter-ethnic tolerance, both at the destination and the origin. Ultimately, though it is too early to predict, we believe that remote voting has the potential to transform India into ‘One Nation One Voter’ – a leap from an elite-based democracy to a people’s democracy.