India not yet ready for digital polling

India not ready yet to embrace digital polling, says TV Mohandas Pai, chairman of Manipal Global Education and a former Infosys board member, in an interview with Ritwik Mukherjee.

Excerpt:

What are the economic implications of a lengthy, cumbersome and expensive election process in a large democracy like India? The costs are eventually passed on to the common people. Aren’t they?

Yes. Absolutely right. During the election time, the government comes to a standstill, economic activity is hurt severely and overall decisions are delayed. And as a result of all these, costs spike up significantly.

If you are to survive as a democracy, you need to have an election process. So, is there any other socioeconomic solution to democracy going without the humongous cost of the elections?

Well, I think we need a single day election for Parliament and the state assemblies or the state assemblies and local panchayats.

What would be your take on moving away from a lengthy and expensive physical polling process to a more convenient digital polling process? What are the pluses and minuses?

Digital polling is truly great. There are both pluses and minuses of digital polling. One of the most important plus points of digital polling is faster turnaround. I would say the minus point is much training is needed before it is implemented. As of now, the environment is difficult for us to implement this. India is a varied country with differential conditions and therefore, it is difficult and challenging to implement this.

What could be the likely economic/political/social/infrastructure and legal challenges in the process of implementing this (online election)?

Yes, there are legal, economic, political and social implications of this. The legal challenge depends on amending our laws. The economic implication is that costs will be lower. Politically, it is very difficult to translate into action. And the social challenges stem from varied conditions across the country.

Would it strengthen our democracy by making the electoral process cleaner, fairer?

Yes, it would somewhat strengthen our democracy, but could disadvantage people who have lesser excess.

Don’t you think that political parties are confident of enjoying popular support on this move?

It is difficult to say this at this point in time as many in India are still unable to use this.

Do you think that the Indian society is socially and economically matured en­o­­ugh to embrace an online election process, sans the hugely expensive political roadshows and campaign process?

The Indian society is not socially and economically matured enough to embrace an online election process…. Not today.