An Open Letter to Mallika Sarabhai

 Saw your ‘all hearts’ interview with Sujit Nair (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hPWQhi1XaRM).

Our generation, including Narendra Bhai which is in its 70’s has had a tumultuous roller coaster ride, rising from the ashes so to speak along with India. And most of us who left IIMA, half a century ago have lived an exciting and satisfying life. Your tears of helplessness that flowed unabashedly are unexpected from the Mallika of 74-76; an impossibly attractive and entitled woman who was from another ‘galaxy’. These tears reflect a few expected disappointments in an otherwise fulfilling life.    

Your disappointments are magnified by the callous attitude and aggressive behaviour of “People’ Representatives’ post 2002. It is unfortunate that our PRs, once elected promptly mortgage their rights and responsibilities to the Political Parties for a few bucks (in Crores): Party bosses while professing to be Sewak of “We the People” never hesitate to orchestrate events like 1975 (emergency), 1984 (Sikh riots), 1990 (Mandal) 1992-93 (Babri Masjid), 2002 (Godhra), 2012 (Anti-Corruption), 2015 (Akhlaq), 2016 (DeMo), 2019 (Pulwama), 2023 (Nuh). These are part of the continuous ‘wars’ that our ‘democratic monarchs’ are engaged in. They may not use guns and bombs against each other; the cannon fodder remains the same, i.e. We the People.   

All governance rules, codes and constitutions, in all cultures and under various ‘isms’ have been developed and operated by wo/men in Power, driven by the underlying concern to ‘control’ the ‘pagans. And ‘we the people’ have allowed these worthies to even staddle our social, religious and cultural lives, way beyond the legitimate role in providing security- internal and external, and making policy choices for the economy.   

Having ensured economic security after a lifetime of managing Commercial enterprises, one had time to look up: And mind space to deeply study the issues in our social and public spaces. Could the basic management tools of “Structures Systems and Processes” and ‘incentives’ be used to devise Good Governance Practices- the political GMP?

It must be noted that the economy is a hard place and its political and commercial management require ‘nerves of steel’: Ethics and morality may operate at the margin. 

Being mindful of the constitutional principles of ‘checks and balance’ and separation of powers, “Factory Resets’ have been crafted to, i) create equal opportunities for Capacity Building – of living and being, ii) equality of opportunity to be ‘elected’ and ‘selected’, and iii) be able to work with adequate degrees of freedom’ in institutions that are in turn committed to work on their intended/ constitutional purpose using “GGP’, iv) be handsomely paid and above all v) be recognised and applauded for ‘good’ outcomes, as envisioned in the Preamble.   

Probably it is a first attempt by a member of “We the People '', the sovereign in a democracy, at writing the “Governance Rules’. The tapasya of eight long years by this Vaanprasthi ‘baniya’ was published in November 2023 – “Factory Reset of Governance Rules' ' – Democracy FOR the People.

This Business Plan for democratic governance also saves substantial sums for the 'Bhartiya Lok Nidhi’, while ensuring ‘good bang for the buck’ for “we the people".   

I propose to devote my resources and the next eight years, most of the rest of life, to push the “Resets”, the “implementation prescriptions’, to the center stage.

May I request (shamelessly) that you and Sujit pick up a copy online, review it for a way larger audience that you command. Gee, the thought of honoring your tears has turned out to be a lengthy diatribe that took three days to ‘sculpt’!   

Level Playing Fields

 Level Playing Fields 

In a democracy, elections are a pivotal point in the life of an aspiring politician. Her social, political and even economic standing depends on the outcome of the election. Therefore, the 'animal spirits' of the political humans are in full roar. 

 

*"Model code of conduct" (a 312-page document for GE 2019, and 215 pages for GE 2024) and massive policing ‘bandobast’ and spends end up catching some 'freebies' and/or a slap on the wrist of erring politicos (friendly?). The punishment for a similar misbehaviour is wildly different depending on the stature and level of the offender. 

And many wide-eyed accounts of soaring election expenses by Candidates (in tens of Crores), by Political Parties (in thousands of Crores) and by Government and non-state actors (in hundreds of Crores) appear in the public domain: The Election commission in its wisdom tries to ensure a ‘level playing field’ by allowing an election expense of ₹95 Lakh per candidate for Lok Sabha and ₹40 Lakh for Vidhan Sabha. A small change!  

*And the cries for “level playing field’ become strident and shrill.

Recently, another element has been added this ‘cauldron’ viz. “loss of governance time’: A ‘High Level Committee’ of “High-Level Personages’ has been constituted to work on this oxymoron.  

 

*Shakespeare opined that “all the world’s a stage, and all the wo/men are but actors”. The Contestants in every ‘competitive’ human activity- sports, business, politics and all else, require a ‘level playing field’ for effective and beneficial ‘play’ of their capabilities.    

Most ‘stages’ in human affairs are naturally uneven; but the ‘wo/men in power’ are wont to design ‘rules’ that tilt the fields in their favour and dig holes to handicap the ‘others’.

 

*The Election Processes need an urgent reset ensuring that ‘We the People’ are enabled to elect a candidate worthy of our trust.  

Factory Reset 1.0: The Election Commission should first call for nominations to be completed by a given date. 

Reset 1.1: The EC after scrutiny and approval of nomination must announce the list of candidates for each of the constituencies, by day 30.

Reset 1.2 “We the People” will be duly informed the list of Candidates who are vying to win our trust, and their declared credentials, thru the local media. 

Reset 1.3: The district administration will organise 'Election Townhall' to educate the electorate. 

Reset 1.4: Panchayats will ensure that ~1,200 households under its jurisdiction (average for India) are well documented, enabling them to vote. 

  

Factory Reset 2.0:  On the 31st Day all nominated persons will be declared and addressed as "Candidate"; and all must resign their positions of power and profit.    

Reset 2.1: The President's Rule will be imposed and the Government will function with a council of Secretaries under leadership of the Cabinet Secretary. 

Reset 2.2: On the 31^st days the Election Schedule will be announced. 

 

Factory Reset 3.0:  The Candidates must return to their constituencies and must campaign only in her constituency and nowhere else, for next 30 days. 

Reset 3.1: Candidates may canvass and speak to their electorate from a common and same platform, as practiced in Mizoram. (Mizoram tops the “happiness index’ charts in India)

Reset 3:1 The ECI will schedule the voting and result days appropriately.

  

*The Book "Factory Reset of Governance Rules" -Democracy FOR the People, which is a 'business plan' for Good Governance, lays out resets to ensure that a candidate may hope to win the election by spending less than ₹ One Crore. 

And, the cost to the "Bhartiya Lok Nidhi" - the Consolidated Fund of India will be almost NIL. 

 

*The Economy may gainfully utilise additional ₹60K Crores to ₹70K Crores for uses that economically strengthen the Republic: Enabling it to move many citizens to economic security.

*More importantly, our ‘unshackled’ People’s Representatives will operate with adequate ‘degrees of freedom’ to discharge their compact with her constituents and her constitutional responsibilities: Enabling Bharat to take firm strides towards a “Khushhaal Bharat”.     

EVM & Election of People’ Representatives

With the General Election 2024 being only months away the media wars are heating up around manipulation’ of results in favour of ‘powerful’ and/or those in power.

*The ‘tool’, at the centre of this cacophony is the Electronic Voting Machines, and the processes surrounding the voting, maintaining the integrity of the processes of collating, counting, tallying and declaring the results.

*The din serves a useful purpose of keeping all concerned on their toes.

 

*In 2019 general elections ECI reported a mismatch of votes polled and counted in a whopping 373 seats ~69% of the seats for which elections were held: There were surplus votes in 220 Seat while 153 seats reported a deficit. There are 6 seats where the discrepancy in votes is higher than the winning margin. A suspicion of ‘manipulation’ is therefore valid as there is no satisfactory explanation for these ‘result changing’ aberrations available in the public domain.

 

*The demand for return to “Paper Ballots’ is a non sequitur. Even those proposing it know it. Booth capturing/mass rigging by miscreants to intimidating the polling personnel and stamping the Ballot papers on particular symbol and escaping in a matter of minutes, is surely prevented by the use of EVMs.

*Thiru TN Seshan exerted all the Constitutional Powers of a CEC to the hilt- no-holds barred to control the animal spirits of the contenders for political power. His management of election processes on this vast sub-continent left behind many robust SoPs for conducting elections.  

 

*The ‘hacking’ charge is easily dismissed since all three components of the EVM --‘Ballot Unit (BU), the VVPAT and Control Unit (CU) are fully isolated once placed in the polling booth: There is no internet, wi-fi or blue tooth access. Both ECIL and BEL the manufactures and indeed the Prof A.G. Rao and Prof Ravi Poovaiah of IIT Bombay, who designed the system must have used ‘hacking’ to ensure a “fit for use’ EVM.   

 

*The Election Commission of India supervised and managed the “1952 polls that had 173 million electors, who walked up to the presiding officers sitting under a tree, and cast their vote in unprotected polling stations.

*Cut to 2019, the Election Commission issued ‘tamper proof’ ‘voter ID cards’ to 911.9 million electors. The voter turnout being 67.4 per cent, 614 million votes were cast.

*Padma Bhushan Sukumar Sen, our first CEC, supervised the 1952 general elections, that had only 1,874 candidates from 53 parties contesting in 401 constituencies. It required 1.96 lakh polling booths.

*CEC Sunil Arora supervised the fractious 2019 general elections that featured 8,054 candidates from 673 parties in 543 constituencies with 10.37 lakh polling booths. He lamented that EVMs were being treated like a "football" by parties suffering electoral losses. "It is not possible to manipulate EVMs. But technical snags are possible as in case of any other device, but are promptly fixed”. (Eco Times – Mar 1^st 2024 -PTI)

*These numbers compare favourably with the combined population of USA plus the 27 countries of European Union: And have earned the epithet of “The Gold Standard” for the Indian Electoral Processes in the democratic world. Former CEC Nasim Zaidi asserted that “the ECI enjoys trust and confidence of people …. for delivering regular, periodic, credible and acceptable elections every time and on time since 1952". (Eco Times – Feb 2024)

 

*The EVMs were improved over 22 years before its full deployment in 2004 general election, with model called 'M1 EVMs'. A 'M2 EVMs' was used between 2006 to 2010. The latest generation of EVMs, produced since 2013, are known as 'M3 EVMs', incorporating the Voter Verifiable Paper Audit Trail (VVPAT) machines, pursuant to Supreme Court orders.  

*The model obsolescence and expected wear and tear and service life explains the difference between the produced numbers and the stock with Election Commission. The ECI junked 9,30,430 EVMs purchased before 2006 as the older machines are nearing their 15-year life cycle.

(HT -2^nd Apil 2017).

*In 2024 General Election, due in April-May, EC estimates that 11.8 Lakh polling stations will be established requiring 30.78 lakh EVMs. (ET – 28^th Dec 2023)

 

*There is no proof that EVMs have been manipulated in any of the past elections. However, concerned people claim that the risks are there.

*Madhav Deshmukh, an IT Expert, explains that since the ‘vote’ flows thru the VVPAT unit to the ‘Control Unit” it may be fudged. Even if the ‘correct’ ‘chunav chinh’ appears in the VVPAT window for 7 seconds, the VVPAT may send another to the Control Unit (CU).  

*Given that it is Voter’ constitutional right to put her ballot in the box: the VVPAT devise should be connected in parallel, enabling the voter to transmit her vote directly to the Control Unit, after ‘verification’.  

*There are doubts expressed about the robustness of processes pairing the BU and CU; the opening and closing of the polling day; the transport of EVMs to the Counting Stations, security and integrity of counting processes. (Remember: There are 6 seats where the discrepancy in votes is higher than the winning margin-2019 GE).

 

*It is axiomatic that errors, random or manipulated occur at “Process Interfaces”. A few technical and process fixes will assuage the ‘doubters’ and even help control mischievous intents, improve efficiencies and cut costs.

Process 1: Before actual poll, Mock-poll is conducted in the polling station in the presence of polling agents of the contesting candidates, ensuring that the BU press registers correctly in the Control Unit. After Mock-poll, data of mock poll is cleared and Result section is sealed with green paper seal, tags & thread.

A Technical Fix: Replace the ‘green paper seal, tags and thread’ with or add a ‘bank locker’ type locking system.

Process 2: The polling officer presses “ballot button’ on CU and the ‘green light’ on BU glows, indicating that the Voter may cast her vote. Once s/he casts her vote, the ‘Red Candidate lamp’ lights up.

2b: And the VVPAT window shows the Symbol for 7 seconds and prints a paper slip; and the Vote is sent from the VVPAT unit to and is registered in the Control Unit. A count of VVPAT slips from 5% of the polling stations during the counting process is supposed to certify the integrity of Election Results. There is demand for 100% counting of Paper Slips, adding enormous time and costs to the process.      

A Technical Fix: Let’s hand over the ‘confirmation’ to the voter herself, i) Add two switches, “GREEN- OK” at the bottom of BU and “RED- Not OK’ on top of the BU, ii) Convert the VVPAT to only a “Vote Verification Unit” – VVU – eliminate printer and paper, and iii) Connect the VVU only to BU – remove its connection to CU.    

Process Fix: The Voter, if s/he sees the correct symbol in the VVU, presses the “Green -OK’ button. This action alone sends the Vote to and is registered in the CU. And the VVU window closes.

*The “VVU” will not cost more than ₹500, saving ₹15,500, by eliminating the expensive printer and paper rolls; halving the cost of EVM Unit. There would be enormous saving of time and money at the counting stage as well.

If s/he presses the “Red-Not OK’ switch her first vote is ‘deleted’ and s/he may rectify her vote.   

 

Process 3: After completion of poll, EVMs are escorted back to strong room and the Polled EVMs are stored under 24 X 7 security.

A Fix: BEL and ECIL may create a WORM (Write Once, Read Many) flash drive where the entered content cannot be deleted, formatted, erased, altered or manipulated.

*Candidates buy and provide WORM USBs to each of their Authorised Polling Agents, who register with the Presiding Officer of the Polling station.  

*At the end of Poling day, the Polling agents are allowed to download voting data from the CUs on to their WORM USB. This will enable each Candidate to confirm the “result” declared by the ECI, after compiling the raw data from their own Poling Agents.

*The Candidates will have raw data for analysing and help develop their electoral strategy in future (Reduce the power of large parties)

*And the concerns around ‘pairing of BU & CU, Tracking of EVMs etc are alleviated and sources of variation/errors in the results reduced if not fully eliminated.

*A few pre-poll steps may also be rationalised to improve efficiencies: And the ECI may develop algorithms defining variation limits within which the Results can be declared and/or repoll ordered. 

 

*Transparency built thru the above ‘fixes will improve the ‘health of election processes which is but one of steps to ensure a healthy democracy. The purpose however is to elect 542 People’ Representatives to represent “we the people’ in Lok Sabha: A body that is central to the functioning of the Indian State. 

*The ‘dance of democracy’ played out on daily basis shows that our PRs are whipped and corralled into just being a ‘number’ that leaves her brains and souls on those steps to the Sabha, where the great leader touched his forehead.  

*After eight years of work, the book, “Factory Resets of Governance Rules” -Democracy FOR the People, lays out a set of ‘implementation prescriptions’ – a ‘business plan’ that uses ‘Good Governance Practices’ based on the spirit of our Constitution: More specifically, the Preamble to the Constitution.  

*The Chapter 4 – The People’ Representatives, sets out the structure, systems, processes (in about 15 pages) such that each candidate may spend under one crore for her election, loosening the hold of pressure groups and lobbyists. S/he is also generously incentivised to act conscientiously on behalf of her constituents.  

*Incidentally, Mizoram uses one of the “Resets” to election process- hopefully effectively.