India does not have an election-less year. With 28 States and seven Union Territories, the world's largest democracy hurtles from one Assembly election to another. In 2012, over a period of three months beginning January, five States — Manipur, Punjab, Uttarakhand, Uttar Pradesh, and Goa — will go to the polls. Five years ago, elections to these States were held during three separate periods: Manipur, Punjab, and Uttarakhand in February; Uttar Pradesh in April-May; and Goa in June. Unlike in 2007, this time the schedules for all five States were announced on the same day, and a common date, March 4, was fixed for counting the votes. The Election Commission of India had more than one reason to announce all five together. A shortened period is administratively convenient, but more importantly, it allows for reasoned, practical application of the Model Code of Conduct for political parties. Though essential to ensure that ruling parties do not abuse power or misuse the official machinery, and to regulate the election campaign, the model code often holds up welfare schemes and development projects. Also, quite rightly, the code is binding not only on the governments in the States where an Assembly election is being held, but also on the Central government. To collapse the elections into a single time frame, wherever possible, is therefore desirable and may even be necessary.
However, the perception is that the timing of the announcement of the election schedule was to the advantage of the Congress, the leading constituent of the United Progressive Alliance government. Although Chief Election Commissioner S.Y. Quraishi asked the Centre to bear in mind the model code while presenting the Railway and Union Budgets in February, the poll managers of the Congress already appear to have had their way with the government. Just two days before the Election Commission released the schedule, the Union Cabinet, in an instance of exquisite timing, cleared a sub-quota of 4.5 per cent for backward minority communities within the 27 per cent reserved for the Other Backward Classes in education and government employment. Whatever be the role of the EC in this, the Congress stands exposed in its cynical attempts to tap into the so-called Muslim vote-bank in Uttar Pradesh. If indeed the EC planned to hold the U.P. election prior to the school public examinations, the announcement could have been made earlier. Actually, the Uttar Pradesh government had advanced the public examinations to early March in anticipation of elections in April. The scheduling might be somewhat controversial but, in the big picture of an Assembly election, these details might not appear all that sharp.
