I have said this before but want to repeat. Why do people believe that electoral funding is at the root of corruption? People enter electoral politics, in this country, primarily to get access to State power which offers the biggest possible opportunity to make windfall gains (in money terms and in terms of social status and power) in very quick time. State power is a business opportunity, infinitely superior to any other and requires few skills other than slyness, lax moral standards and ruthlessness. As long the State has such an overwhelming position in our lives ( the overdeveloped Indian State) with a monopoly on most resources, it will remain the most attractive opportunity for rapid enrichment. The funds required for getting elected is a small investment with extraordinarily high returns and one can break even within a few months of getting elected. So those elected become corrupt not because they have to give returns to those that have invested in them but because they stand to aggrandise more wealth by accessing State power than through regular entrepreneurial/industrial effort. Unless the State becomes a less attractive opportunity for rent seeking enterprises, the issue of electoral funding will make no difference to the rottenness of the politics of the State. That can happen only if the power of the Big State is whittled down and diminished. And that, in turn, can happen only by increasing the sphere for market forces to operate, for legitimate innovation led entrepreneurship to flourish, more and more devolution of State power to the states, and a bigger, greater role for local governments and non state organisations in public affairs. In parallel, the cost of entry into politics has to be brought down both by making local governments an affordable point for entry into electoral politics with a smooth way forward into state and national level politics and by trebling or quadrupling the size of the State legislatures and the Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha so that the constituencies are much smaller and much more affordable in terms of costs.
Posted on: Thu, 24 Apr 2014 06:32:28 +0000
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