Rashmi Bansal, the editor JAM magazine recently wrote an article for Businessworld on the Association for Democratic Reform (ADR). Following that, I had written to her about the need to give such efforts more exposure, and had mentioned that I was a volunteer for the ADR during the 2004 general elections. She asked me to write about my experiences so that it could be published in JAM. I’m posting below what I sent her. The slightly edited version which was published in the magazine can be found online here.

The first time I exercised my democratic right to vote was during the 2004 general elections. Like anybody who has just become eligible to vote, I was looking forward to the experience. As the elections were fast approaching, I enthusiastically followed all the political news. After all, I had to vote and it was a great responsibility you see.

My new found interest in politics brought me across an article about the Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR) started by a group of IIM-A professors. They wanted to do something about the criminalization of politics in our country, and were successful in getting the Supreme Court of India to uphold a PIL which made it mandatory for everyone seeking public office to disclose their criminal, financial and educational history. It was a way to ensure that the voters knew the important details about their “esteamed” leaders, and steamed they were indeed. In a move that is usually reserved for pay hikes, all the political parties were united in opposition of this requirement. But thankfully, even their unity wasn’t enough to prevent the Supreme Court order.

The ADR then started their “election watch”, which was an activity where they tried to make sure that the voters were well informed about their candidates before voting. The article which provided all this information also had a note at the end about the need for volunteers to make this effort a success. As you might have guessed by now, I volunteered. The fact that I was in the final semester of my engineering studies, which is a pretty jobless period as any engineer would know, and that I would get to work with people who had IIT, IIM, Phd. in MIT next to their names certainly influenced my decision. Anyway, I managed to convince a few more jobless friends and off we went to make a difference in the electoral process. Oh yeah!

Our first job as volunteers was to man the phone (I’ll call it hotline to make it sound more exciting), and help prospective voters in getting themselves registered, identifying their wards etc. Then again, I didn’t expect a Tehelka style assignment exposing the politicians anyway. The real fun started post hotline manning. The ADR wanted to come out with a report before the elections with data obtained from the affidavits filed by all the candidates with their juicy details. We needed to scrape out the required information from the affidavits. And boy was it an eye opener. Calling it just an eye opener would be an understatement. The criminalization of politics in our country is rampant across party lines. While that in itself may not be very surprising, actually seeing the list of crimes against each name is a totally different experience. In those few days I learnt more about the different sections of crimes in the IPC than I’d care to. Section 420 and its cousins are among the politician’s best friends. Right from petty crimes to attempted murder, dacoity, robbery… our politicians have done it all. The funny thing was that if they had ever been arrested as part of some protest, or activities that they have risked their life and limb for the dear people they represent, you could bet your life that it would be at the top of the list. How noble and Gandhian. “But what about that attempted murder and robbery down the list, sir?” we would want to ask if we had the opportunity. “Err… politically motivated” would surely be the answer. Though it was sometimes fun in a weird kind of way to go through the affidavits filed by the high profile politicians, more often than not the hypocrisy of their claims of wealth, or rather the lack of it, was truly a wonder. Whenever I noticed an actor-on-the-way-out and now wannabe-politician listing an income which wouldn’t even be enough to buy his wig, I’d be extremely tempted to call him using the available contact info and ask, “Dude, do they pay you peanuts because you get to run around trees with hot actresses?”

But, to be fair, there were a few (please note the “few”) candidates who had excellent records, atleast from what their disclosure claimed. Hopefully they are now representing some of us.

Anyway, after a lot of work by many volunteers, the report was prepared and a press conference was called to release it. As I had expected, the papers highlighted only the criminals-per-party numbers the next day. The report also contained information on all candidates that the voters could use to make a more informed decision. I carefully went through the profiles of the candidates who were vying for my vote and decided to vote for different parties at the centre and state. It’s the candidate who is important and not the party kind of idealism. As luck would have it the party I voted for in the centre came to power in the state and vice versa. Damn it! What a waste of time researching the backgrounds of people who were totally out of the game now.

Did I really waste my time? I don’t think so. I truly believe that if all of us sit at home laughing at the sight of our politicians throwing chairs at each other in parliament, we are the losers. If I can’t do anything substantial by myself, I’m willing to atleast help someone who’s trying in any small way I can. Anyway, the great Indian tamasha of 2004 ended, but make no mistake; it will be back with a vengeance in five years. Will I be there to “watch” our heroes again? Absolutely.