Political Science · Ch 9 — Era of One-party Dominance
Challenge of building democracy
Challenge of building democracy
Building Democracy in Hard Times
The previous chapter laid out just how difficult independent India's early circumstances were — the pressing, immediate work of holding the new nation together. Many other countries that gained independence around the same period, faced with comparable strain, chose to set democracy aside altogether. Their leaders argued that unity had to come first, and that democratic competition would only import fresh conflict at the worst possible time. That choice produced non-democratic rule across a good part of the newly-decolonised world — sometimes democracy in name only under one all-powerful leader, sometimes formal one-party control, sometimes outright military rule. Almost invariably, these regimes promised that democracy was only being postponed, never abandoned; almost invariably, once entrenched, they proved extremely hard to remove.
India faced no less difficult a starting position. Yet its leadership chose the harder road anyway — which, on reflection, is not so surprising, given how central the idea of democracy had been to the freedom movement itself. They did not regard politics as something to be feared or minimised; they saw political contest as the very mechanism through which a society works out its disagreements. Every society has to decide, somehow, how it will be governed, and every society contains groups with different, often conflicting interests and preferences. Democratic politics was, in this view, simply the mechanism best suited to resolving those conflicts — even though, on the surface, politics might look like nothing more than a contest for power. Making that mechanism real, in practice and not just on paper, was the path India's leaders committed to.
Setting Up the Machinery
The Constitution itself — adopted 26 November 1949, signed 24 January 1950, and brought into force on 26 January 1950 — had already been studied the previous year. Until an elected government could be installed, the country continued to be run by an interim administration. With the Constitution's rules now in place, the next task was to build the actual machinery of elections. The Election Commission of India came into being in January 1950 under Sukumar Sen, its first Chief Election Commissioner, and the expectation at the time was that the country's first general election could be held before the year was out.
An Undertaking of Unprecedented Scale
That expectation did not survive contact with reality. Conducting a genuinely free and fair election across a country the size of India turned out to be a far bigger undertaking than anyone had anticipated. Two jobs alone consumed enormous amounts of time: delimiting constituency boundaries, and compiling accurate electoral rolls listing every eligible voter. The rolls threw up an immediate problem — nearly 40 lakh women had been entered not by their own names but simply as "wife of…" or "daughter of…". The Election Commission rejected these entries outright, insisting they be corrected where possible and struck off the rolls where they could not be.
The scale of what followed had no real precedent anywhere in the world:
- roughly 17 crore citizens were eligible to vote;
- they would elect close to 3,200 state assembly members and 489 members of the Lok Sabha;
- only around 15 per cent of these voters could read or write;
- and the Commission had to train more than 3 lakh officers and polling staff to run the exercise on the ground.
"The Biggest Gamble in History"
What made this election extraordinary wasn't only its size — it was also the first real test anywhere of whether democracy could work in a country that was both poor and largely illiterate. Up to that point, democratic government had only really taken root in wealthy, highly literate societies, mostly in Europe and North America — some of which, at that very time, still hadn't extended the vote to all their own women. Against that backdrop, India's decision to give every adult citizen the vote struck many observers, at home and abroad, as reckless. An Indian editor famously described it as "the biggest gamble in history". The magazine Organiser predicted that Jawaharlal Nehru "would live to confess the failure of universal adult franchise in India". A British member of the Indian Civil Service went further, claiming that "a future and more enlightened age will view with astonishment the absurd farce of recording the votes of millions of illiterate people".
Voting Without Being Able to Read
With so much of the electorate unable to read candidate names, the Commission needed a voting method that didn't depend on literacy. Its solution: a separate sealed box for each candidate inside every polling booth, each box marked with that candidate's election symbol, into which voters dropped a blank ballot paper for whichever candidate they were choosing. Roughly 20 lakh steel boxes were manufactured for this purpose nationwide. A presiding officer from Punjab left a detailed, first-hand account of what preparing these boxes actually involved: "Each box had to have its candidate's symbol, both inside and outside it, and outside on either side, had to be displayed the name of the candidate in Urdu, Hindi and Punjabi along with the number of the constituency, the polling station and the polling booth. The paper seal with the numerical description of the candidate, signed by the presiding officer, had to be inserted in the token frame and its window closed by its door which had to be fixed in its place at the other end by means of a wire. All this had to be done on the day previous to the one fixed for polling. To fix symbols and labels the boxes had first to be rubbed with sandpaper or a piece of brick. I found that it took about five hours for six persons, including my two daughters, to complete this work. All this was done at my house."
This box system lasted only through the first two general elections. It then gave way to a single ballot paper listing every candidate's name and symbol, on which voters stamped their choice — a method that stayed in use for close to four decades, before the Election Commission began introducing Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) toward the end of the 1990s. The transition to EVMs nationwide was complete by 2004.
Polling Day, and What It Showed …
The figure shows a sample of the ballot paper that was used in India from the third general election (1962) to the thirteenth general election (1999). This was the second method of voting adopted after the first two elections, where voters had to drop a blank ballot into a candidate's box. In this later method, the ballot paper itself listed all the candidates along with their names and election symbols.
The layout is a single sheet of paper, divided into columns. On the left side, there is a column for the serial number of each candidate. Next to it is a column for the candidate's name. The largest column on the right displays the election symbol assigned to each candidate — these symbols (like a pair of bullocks, a lotus, a hand, a bicycle, etc.) were crucial because most voters were illiterate and identified their preferred candidate by the symbol. At the top of the ballot paper, there is space for the constituency name, the polling station number, and the serial number of the ballot paper itself. The voter was given a rubber stamp and had to place a mark (a cross or a tick) in the column next to the candidate of their choice. …
The figure shows a sample ballot paper that was used in Indian general elections from the third Lok Sabha election (1962) up to the thirteenth (1999). This was the second method of voting adopted after the first two elections, where voters had to drop a blank ballot into a candidate's box. Here, the ballot paper itself lists all the candidates contesting from a constituency, along with their names and election symbols.
The layout is straightforward: the paper is divided into rows, one for each candidate. Each row contains the candidate's name (usually in multiple languages, as the textbook mentions for earlier ballot boxes), and next to it, the officially allotted election symbol — for example, a pair of bullocks for the Congress party, an elephant for others, or a bicycle, lamp, or hand. These symbols were crucial because over 80% of voters were illiterate at the time; they could identify their preferred party or candidate by the picture rather than by reading the name.
At the top of the ballot paper, there is typically a heading stating "Ballot Paper" and the name of the constituency and the election (e.g., "Lok Sabha General Election, 1971"). A column for the voter to mark their choice — usually a blank square or circle next to each candidate's row — is also present. The voter would receive this paper at the polling booth, go into a screened enclosure, and put a rubber stamp (or a mark) on the symbol of the candidate they wished to vote for. They would then fold the paper and drop it into a common ballot box, not into separate candidate boxes as in the first two elections. …
The figure shows a sample of the ballot paper that was used in Indian Lok Sabha elections from the third general election (1962) through the thirteenth (1999). This was the second method of voting adopted after the first two elections, where voters had to drop a blank ballot into a candidate's box. In this newer system, the ballot paper itself listed all candidates along with their election symbols, and the voter simply had to put a stamp next to the name of the candidate they wished to vote for.
The ballot paper is laid out as a single sheet, with the names of candidates printed in a column. Next to each candidate's name is their allotted election symbol — for example, a pair of bullocks for the Congress party, an ear of corn for another party, a bicycle, a lamp, a tree, and so on. These symbols were crucial because a large portion of the electorate was illiterate; voters could identify their preferred party or candidate by the picture rather than by reading the name. The symbols are printed clearly, one per candidate, in a row or column format.
At the top of the ballot paper, there is typically a heading indicating it is a ballot paper for the Lok Sabha, along with the constituency name and number. The paper also includes a space for the presiding officer's signature or stamp, and instructions (often in multiple languages) telling the voter to put a stamp on the symbol of the candidate they choose. The layout is designed to be simple and unambiguous: each candidate gets one row, with their symbol, name, and sometimes their party affiliation printed together. …
The cartoon, published in Shankar on 20 May 1951, shows a sample of the ballot paper that was used from the third to the thirteenth general elections to the Lok Sabha. This is the paper-ballot system that replaced the earlier method of dropping a blank ballot into a candidate's box.
The ballot paper is laid out as a single sheet. It lists the names of candidates in a column, and next to each name is the election symbol of that candidate’s party or independent status. The symbols are simple, recognisable images — for example, a pair of bullocks for the Congress, an elephant for a different party, a lamp, a hand, a tree, and so on. These symbols were crucial because, as the textbook explains, only 15 per cent of eligible voters were literate in 1951. The symbols allowed an illiterate voter to identify their preferred candidate without needing to read.
The layout is clear: each candidate’s name is printed in multiple languages (likely Hindi, Urdu, and English, as was common), and the symbol appears in a box beside the name. The voter would mark their choice with a rubber stamp on the symbol of the candidate they wanted to vote for. This method — stamping on a printed ballot paper — was used for nearly forty years, from the third general election until the late 1990s, when electronic voting machines (EVMs) took over. …
The figure shows a sample ballot paper from India’s third to thirteenth general elections to the Lok Sabha. It is a rectangular sheet, divided into two columns. On the left side, each candidate’s name is printed in a row, with a blank space to the left of the name where the voter would place a stamp. On the right side, directly opposite each name, is the election symbol of that candidate — a simple black-and-white line drawing. The symbols shown include a pair of bullocks (for the Congress party), an elephant, a hand, a lotus, a star, a bicycle, a tree, and a lamp, among others. At the top of the ballot paper, the words “BALLOT PAPER” are printed, along with the name of the constituency and the serial number of the polling station. The entire paper is designed so that a voter, even if illiterate, could identify their preferred candidate by the symbol alone. …