Sample Essay on Challenges Facing Indian Democracy
As a developing nation, India is one of the nations of the world, which struggle with having a purely democratic society. It faces an array of challenges, which weigh heavily on its people and on its efforts to rise to higher standards of governance. In this paper, we discuss some of the leading challenges facing Indian democracy today.
The first demeaning democracy in India is governance. To some people, like Gurcharan Das author of India Grows at Night, believes that there is no greater challenge facing India than governance. Many have come to accept the fact that having things done in such a huge population is not an easy task; it is too demanding. Parliament proceedings face challenges from the opposition, which usually carries its own political and could easily block a course that does not favor their personal interests. Because of this, implementing important issues in parliament is a tall order for those in government. In order to tame the conflicts between the government and parliament, experts suggest the need to have small changes in India’s Parliamentary system. This includes the elimination of the law that requires government to have consensus on every issue before implementation. There has to be away for the government to engage the opposition constructively for the better of the people of India. Moreover, India needs a strong and democratic system of governance to eliminate ill-motivated cases where people challenge the incumbent alone.
Since democracy is about allowing the voice of people to be heard, through free and fair elections, voter turnout in India is a major problem. In most cases, huge turnouts are witnessed in disadvantaged regions. Recently, most electorates voted because of the entry of other political movements, challenging massive corruption in India. However, the bulging middle class population in India further contributes to unwillingness of people to vote. Because of poor performance of leaders, a section of Indians, especially the working class does not bother being part of an electoral process that determines the leaders of a nation.
India’s government also faces the challenge of implementing laws once they have been passed by parliament. For instance, the Right to Education Act of 2009, allowed children from poor regions to join private schools. The 25% slots in private schools reserved for pupils from economically weaker sections guaranteed opportunities that were hardly heard off in the past. However, the greatest challenge has been the implementation of the law.
For instance, there has been a problem in designing a fair procedure and formula to allocate the slots to the right pupils. Proper implementation of such laws, which seek to reduce the gap between the rich and the poor are important in achieving a democratic state. This is pegged on the fact that education helps people to understand various aspect of governance, challenge the government and appreciate their rights at all times. India’s continued muzzling of people’s freedom of speech especially through the internet further jeopardizes democracy in the world’s most populous nation. On several occasions, the government has blocked websites, Twitter accounts and FaceBook pages of people and groups who appear to challenge the regime. Excess censorship curtails efforts to have a free atmosphere where citizens engage the authorities freely.
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Online Resources:
http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/indiaatlse/2012/12/19/top-10-challenges-for-india-in-2013/
http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/62451/ashutosh-varshney/indias-democratic-challenge