Party time

It’s party time in Goa. And the parties are not just those that take place on beaches, with a lot of singing and dancing, though those are much in evidence as well, Omicron or no Omicron. Goa is also playing host to parties of the political kind, with Arvind Kejriwal’s AAP and Mamata Banerjee’s TMC establishing their presence in the tiny state which already has four national parties, BJP, Congress, Shiv Sena and Sharad Pawar’s NCP, and eight regional parties. This proliferation of political parties is happening not just in Goa but across the country. According to the Election Commission there are currently 2,858 registered parties in India, of which eight are national parties, having a presence in more than one region, and 54 state-level organisations. The rest of the 2,000-odd parties are deemed to be ‘Unrecognised’, in that they exist largely on paper. And the number of these seems to be increasing. Does our overpopulated polity need an overpopulation of parties as well? There are those who would say that it’s this plethora of political factions that is turning our democracy into a doomocracy, where often the splitting of votes between too many contestants results in unstable coalitions that doom the prospect of progress. According to this view, Indian democracy needs even more democratic choice, as represented by a multiplicity of parties, as North Korea needs even more dictatorship. What we need is unity, not disunity, say such advocates. Hogwash, say their opponents. The unity you champion is not unity but uniformity. You want everyone to fit into a uniform, identical mould of your making. Won’t work. Not in a country of 1.4 billion people who speak 22 officially scheduled languages and another 121 unofficial dialects. Who eat differently, dress differently, perhaps dream differently. Such a plurality of people needs a plurality of politics, like the sameness of white light needs a multi-faceted prism to become a spectrum of different shades. Diversity, disunity. Unity, uniformity. These opposing viewpoints will be tested in the upcoming elections in five states. Viewpoints which are poles apart. And polls apart.