It is disheartening how partisanship reduces political leaders at the hustings. Minor functionaries are always likely to fly off the handle and say something out of kilter with the model code of conduct that strives to bring a modicum of control over our noisy general elections. But when senior leaders condone the overstepping of limits, as Mr Mulayam Singh Yadav seems to have done in the case of Mr Azam Khan, it is clear that democracy itself is facing new kinds of threats. Curiously, Mr Yadav himself has been accused of using the privilege of a party in office by threatening to undo a scheme for a section of the electorate, much like Maharashtra’s deputy chief minister Ajit Pawar, if people didn’t vote for them. Election Commission is examining the matter.
Promises, ranging from the outlandish to the mundane, are part and parcel of any election. The freebie culture has been taken to the extremes in a state like Tamil Nadu where even 40 years ago a Dravidian party’s poll plank and promise was rice at Rs 1 a kg (delivered and continuing to date — 20 kg of free rice a month to the needy). Where does democracy draw a line in such matters when a section of the electorate lives not far above the poverty line and thinks politicians who come to seek votes once in five years are fair game for extracting something?
Leaders of eminence who lead national political parties have to show the way if they are to rein in the mavericks who think nothing of belittling the democratic process. It has always been our contention that parties must sit down and thrash these issues out before the polls rather than expect the Election Commission to step in each time a politician steps out of line.
