Title: How India Became Democratic
Author: Ornit Shani
Publisher: Penguin
Price: Rs. 599/-
Pages: xiii + 284
How many people realise that Indians became voters before they were citizens – by the time the Constitution came into force into 1950, the notion of universal franchise and electoral democracy were already grounded. How India became democratic tells the untold story of the preparation of the electoral roll for adult franchise in the world’s biggest democracy. It is a surprise that no book has been written so far on this subject.
One of the important points that the book makes is that “This was no legacy of colonial rule: Indians imagined the universal franchise for themselves, acted on this imaginary, and made it their political reality.” For the record, Pakistan had direct elections for the first time in 1970 and it got split in 1971.
It is surprising that not many in India have thought of how millions of men and women were enrolled as voters in 1950, an electorate that was 85% illiterate. Enormity of the fact dawns when one is reminded, that this was happening when princely states were still in the process of getting merged.
It was not only amazing commitment and teamwork by the concerned officers in the centre and across the country, but also their imagination and enterprise. They fought many small and big battles, like the confusion between census and electoral role, to issues like women refusing to give their names for registration, in some cases even refusing to be registered as wife of Mr X. Apart from the fact that few also proposed that widowed or divorced women should not be part of the electoral role. And, of course, some wanted to stay in Pakistan and be citizens of India.
There was a proposal to get rid of cast from the electoral role, but somehow it was retained, a blow from which India still suffers. The task of preparing the electoral roll was managed by the Constituent Assembly Secretariat under the close guidance of the Constitutional Advisor B N Rau. B N Rau stood shoulder to shoulder with Dr Ambedkar in giving the voice to poor, destitute, and migrants.
The author, Ornit Shani, is a senior lecturer at the Department of Asian Studies, University of Haifa. She needs to be commended for the research work she has undertaken. One must make note that she has explored some very old documents, most of them in government’s possession. The book also has an exhaustive bibliography and index.
The only drawback of the book is the fact that the author in her acknowledgement sounds too dependent on the likes of the controversial Ramachandra Guha. One is not sure what facts would have been hidden to give the book a secular image. This calls for others to look into the whole process of electoral formation in India and publish another book. But, this should not hold back anyone interested in the formation of India and Indian Politics to not study this book.
