The Role of Technology in Indian Politics

 Posters, cut-outs, door to door campaigning and even bribing poor voters is turning out into a farce with technology playing a decisive role in the rise and fall of politicians in the contemporary Indian political scenario. Notwithstanding the fact that India is still a mixed basket of 790 million eligible voters with only an approximate 200 million active internet users, the dream of a digitally empowered India demands proactive politicians to engage in the new communication mediums that influence the public opinion. In fact, the 16^th Lok Sabha elections was a tipping point with the present Prime Minister blazing a trail for 3D rallies, Chai pe Charcha and Mann ki Baat that helped to reach out to millions of people at a time. Albeit the newly found use of technology, the fundamentals of political campaigns remain the same like fund raising, getting feedback, convincing the audience the need for supporting a cause and garnering voters. Of late, political parties are using technology on a large scale to address the above political fundamentals.

Technology circa 2000 until hitherto

The Election Commission began embracing technology with the adoption of the Electronic Voting Machines in 1999 and implemented it in a full scale from the 2004 elections that improved the time efficiency of both casting a vote and declaring results. The Voter-Verified Paper Audit Trail (VVPAT) system was introduced in 8 of the 543 parliamentary constituencies as a pilot project in 2014 aimed at minimising the chances of tampering with the EVMs. Political parties have started using Google Hangout to address various questions about party movements and social media has crept into the mainstream media’s political discussions and objectives. A social media campaign by the Election Commission in last four state assembly elections drew record levels of voter registration and turnout. About 160 million in the 2014 elections were first time voters between the ages of 18 and 24 years old. Political parties are integrating YouTube, Facebook, Twitter and various microsites to reach out to the users of technology.

Impact on politicians

However, the impact of technology on politicians is ambivalent. Firstly, social media platforms has helped the people to engage in political socialization and at the same time, has also created a pulpit for self-proclaimed political pundits, irrespective of their credentials and credibility, to spread their messages that in turn adds to the brouhaha. Secondly, Videos of the speeches of most politicians can be found on YouTube. In many of the posted videos, they are engaged in old speeches, contradicting their current political positions. The media and the opposition utilises these opportunities to score against their rivals. Often, the accessibility of the audio and video clips, and wide media distribution, breeds distrust among voters who support politicians who have had a change of heart. Thirdly, the mass media activism, an emerging trend in India, demands the political fraternity to stay proactive. But sometimes biased and hysterical news anchors tend to channelize a biased outlook keeping realities in the dark.

The future

As is followed in the west, the Indian politicians need to use technology extensively to fund their campaigns. In 2008, the average donation to Barack Obama’s election campaign was 80 USD and those who donated had donated more than once. Realising quality campaign ads and songs through social media can fetch the candidate both popularity and income. The ads of Bernie Sanders in 2016 US presidential election campaign that has gone viral is an example to substantiate the argument 

The future of the role of technology in Indian politics may find the use of QR codes in the brochures and door hangers that allow voters to scan the campaign literature with a smart phone and view regularly updated information and custom videos. It helps them to search for new content and provide timely feedback. Initiatives like Votizen leverages social networks to bring together registered voters and like-minded people, enable candidates to identify and speak directly to voters in their districts. Also social networking sites help political parties to read the minds of the people and act accordingly.  However, the role of technology in Indian politics unlike the developed nations require innovations much more than the otherwise trending use of social media platform in order to reach out to the huge masses of illiterate and poor population. This is why Narendra Modi’s election campaign became a whispering sensation in the entire country in 2014 and changed the style of politics in India.

Importance of private properties

Neo liberalism’s trickle-down theory of catering to the needs of the rich so that development at higher level would trickle down into the lower levels to bring people out of poverty is futile.  But, this does not mean that private property would do harm. Private property has its own advantages.

Firstly, private owners tend to make better use of their property as they will reap the benefits of any increase in its value, or suffer if its value decreases. 

Secondly, the economic value, that is the price that the property will fetch in the future, incentivises the private owner to maintain the asset.

Thirdly, the attempt of the private owners to gain profit ensures competition which would in turn result in innovation. 

The duty of the government is to ensure that the private players do not override the natural market mechanism to indulge in unethical practices. At the same time, the basic framework created by the government must be simple, transparent and conducive to ensure the high performance of private individuals

Ensuring safe functioning of market mechanism

Prices convey a lot of information. It not only tells producers what to produce but rather informs the producers to produce what people want. The more inaccurate the information gets, the lesser will be the economic coordination which will in turn lower satisfaction of wants. Thus interference in the information conveyed by prices is destructive to the economic progress of an economy.

We often fear that an increase in competition and advancement in technology will take away the traditional livelihoods of the people. Norman Macrae, an editor of the Economist, pointed out that with the advent of Industrial Revolution in England, about two thirds of the jobs that existed in the beginning of the century was eliminated by the end of the century, yet there were three times as many people employed at the end of the century. But the jobs were not the same. He pointed out that in the late 1880s, about 60 per cent of the workforce in both the United States and Britain were in agriculture, domestic service and jobs related to horse transport. Today, only 3 per cent of the work force are in those occupations. Jobs will change with competition, but there will always be more new jobs created than the ones lost. 

Kerala being a literate state was subject to this primal fear during the computerisation drive in 1990s. In fact, when the agitation against computerisation subsided and computers replaced manual labour in banks and government offices, employees in Kerala found an enhancement in the quality of their job without leaving anybody unemployed. 

The duty of the government must not be to preserve jobs but to equip individuals to grab better jobs.

Does ideology really matter?

Throughout history, there have been different ideologies promoted by various thinkers. After their death, different schools of thought develop and ardent supporters of the ideologies debate among one another claiming superiority of their schools. Lee Kuan Yew, the most celebrated statesman of Asia shared his success mantra for developing Singapore from a dot of mediocrity to the most developed city state of today. He said, “We are pragmatists. We don’t stick to any ideology. Does it work? Let’s try it and if it does work, fine, let’s continue it. If it doesn’t work, toss it out, try another one. We are not enamoured with any ideology.”  The Economist argue that the welfare oriented Nordic states gained popularity because they were able to inject market mechanisms into welfare state to sharpen its performance.The whole idea behind the formation of a state is to provide a sanguine atmosphere for its citizens to develop their potential to the highest level.

Lucky is the state that do not drench itself in the lacuna of ideologies, but derive its policy framework according to the needs of time and wants of its people.