Maharashtra, India’s second most electorally influential state, has voted. On Saturday at lunchtime, we will know for whom. But given the experience of the recent past, the mandate itself may not throw up a winner. Some among the six major parties are known to disregard the verdict and could easily switch sides to form the government.
In this extremely fluid contest, there’s one constant. One imminently forecastable trend that has remained unchanged for almost two decades — the apathy of Colaba voters, or the SoBo (South Bombay) set, as they are often called.
Here are the underwhelming statistics. While Mumbai recorded a turnout of 52 per cent, only 44.5 per cent of all Colaba voters cared to show up, clearly lagging even the city’s phlegmatic showing.
Colaba may be home to the offices of some of the country’s top industrial houses, hotels, public sector enterprises, the Mantralaya and the courts, but it is no unspoiled idyll. It has crippling civic problems. Moreover, its residents are some of the country’s most opinionated. They are known to protest civic apathy, and are quick to organise marches in defence of human rights and “democratic backsliding”. So, it always mystifies that they tamely surrender the opportunity to make their opinions count — to make a difference on voting day.
“If Maoist-infested Bastar can, then why can’t Colaba?” is the question doing the rounds. It’s a fair question and can’t be explained away by clichés like there is “disenchantment with the choices on offer.” After all, it isn’t as if nearby Bandra or remote Bastar are brimming with the bee’s knees when it comes to the political talent on offer.
The explanation has more to do with agency. An election matters to the denizens of Bastar. Most of the voters of this far-forgotten place have no agency of their own. Who is in office can make all the difference, literally, to their precarious existence. Electing a caste-mate can guarantee the flow of state resources, a leg-up in society and so on and so forth. So, they make sure they are there at the polling booth to secure state and social patronage by picking a candidate most aligned with their interests.
They have access. They have the bureaucrat, the local mayor, the local political honcho on call. At the press of a few buttons on a mobile phone. Pressing a button on the ballot box is what the others do.
Clearly, electoral turnouts in India don’t just reveal the health of participatory democracy in India but are also a marker of social capital in India.
For a set that mouths off about the declining state of Indian democracy, the “SoBo” set, drunk on the ‘arrogance of access’, conveniently forgets that it’s the voting booth which is the great leveller — where rich, poor, old, young all ought to turn out on one day to be heard.
If democracy is alive in India today, if it still holds politicians accountable, if it still retains the capacity to shepherd change, is it because of the less privileged? Think about it.
