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All America needs now is a Laloo

I have been watching the election in the United States with increasing amazement for the better part of two weeks. All I can say is: where is our one and only Laloo Prasad Yadav?

No, I am not joking. The American polls have everything else that foreigners used to sneer at in our own polls. There is a strong dynastic whiff, there are allegations of faulty ballots, there is some proof of unfair electoral practices, there is a seemingly endless delay before the results are published. As I said, all we need is a Laloo Prasad Yadav parading his so-called wit, and it will be a perfect match.

Oh, not quite to be honest. There are quite a few matters where the United States is streets behind 'backward' India. Let us begin with that instance of the ballot papers that supposedly created such confusion in Florida.

I will not comment on the design of the papers themselves. But why is it that literate natives of the First World could be thrown off so much when illiterate Indians find it easy enough to navigate a ballot?

Of course, most Indians also found it no trouble to use the new electronic voting machines. Which brings up my second question: why on earth is the richest nation on this planet persisting with those antiques? Almost the entire United States is using paper ballots or bulky lever-bar machines that are relics of the 1950s.

I remember President Clinton often mentioned how easy it was to get a driving licence over the Internet in Hyderabad; now I know why he made such an issue over it. In many ways the United States is still technologically backward.

I am also a bit stunned by the fact that the United States has not been able to create a single, comprehensible set of electoral rules and regulations. Anyone who wants to know what is applicable in India needs only to visit the Election Commission. (Or, if that is physically demanding, he can visit its website.) How about someone wanting the same information about the United States? All I can say is: good luck!

There is a bewildering array of rules and regulations, with each state coming up with some of its own. Even worse, the situation can vary within any given state; the confusion over the design of the ballot arose because Florida permits each county to choose its own design! I have often disagreed with the Indian Election Commission, and shall doubtless do so again, but watching the situation in the United States I wouldn't exchange it for all the world.

Okay, so what about plain fraud? Whether it is tampering with electoral lists, not counting votes, or attempting to influence voters, everything has a precise counterpart in the United States. There was one case where one dedicated party worker was caught offering cigarettes or something equally innocuous. For God's sake, Indians moved beyond such petty inducements decades ago!

There are other instances of nuttiness that would be laughed out of court in India, as for instance what happened in Missouri.

Mel Carnahan, the Democratic governor (equivalent of an Indian chief minister), was running for the Senate. He died in a plane crash on October 17. Under Indian law, this would have led to the polls being postponed; in the United States it led to a dead man being declared elected. Now, it seems his wife shall automatically step in to that seat, because under American law the governor is allowed to nominate a successor to a senator who is dead.

Pardon me, but what sense does this make? First of all, it is just plain idiotic to elect a dead man. Second, how democratic is it to permit a governor to nominate anyone to an elected office? Third, after getting an earful from Americans about the evils of dynastic rule, couldn't Missouri really find anyone but Jean Carnahan to fill her husband's place?

Of course, Mrs Carnahan is far from being the only one to profit from having a famous surname. Take a look at the two principal candidates for the presidency itself. The Republican nominee is the son of a former president; for good measure another member of the Bush clan is governor of Florida. The Democrat is the son of a former United States senator from Tennessee, and he went on to fill his father's shoes for eight years in the Senate before becoming vice-president. It is not quite as bad as the situation we see in the Congress, but the United States is getting there slowly.

We have all, I am sure, been chided or just sniggered at by Americans for the inefficiencies and/or imperfections of India's electoral system. But is that really true?

India has somewhere between five to six times the electorate of the United States. It does not have the money that American institutions enjoy, and India's communications network is nowhere near as sophisticated nor as widespread. So why is it then that India's elections can be conducted faster, more smoothly, and with far less bad blood than in the United States?

It is true that there was no actual violence in the American polls as there is in India. But that said, there was little that one could see of the vaunted First World superiority in conducting the machinery of democracy.

A dead man getting elected, and his wife being nominated to fill his place. The children and grandchildren of past politicians taking their place in the halls of power as to the manner born. One man getting more votes but another getting the job. Is that what the United States means by democracy?

T V R Shenoy