📰 France wants to work with India in Indo-Pacific
But not as a part of a multilateral arrangement like the “quadrilateral” between India, U.S., Japan and Australia
•France will like to deepen cooperation with India in the Indo-Pacific bilaterally and not as a part of a multilateral arrangement like the recently convened “quadrilateral” between India, U.S., Japan and Australia, officials said here on Wednesday.
•“We have a growing cooperation in the Indian Ocean, where both India and France have focal positions, and we are in the process of forming a defence and security partnership in the Indo-Pacific,” announced France’s Ambassador Alexandre Ziegler, adding that this new cooperation would be discussed as part of the strategic partnership along with cooperation in counter-terrorism, defence hardware, nuclear energy, and space cooperation during the upcoming visit of Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian to India.
•However, senior diplomats clarified that France and India have a “special and specific” interest in the Indian Ocean, and would prefer to conduct their exchanges across the Indo-Pacific bilaterally. “There is a very strong interest on both sides to keep this bilateral,” a French Embassy official told reporters. “We should not forget that India and France have both a geographical presence as well as a traditional connection of trust in the Indian Ocean,” the official added.
Large territory
•France is the only western country with large territory in the Indian Ocean Region (IOR) including the Reunion Islands, that spans about two million square kilometres of an Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ), and it has a population of one million French Citizens in the region, including about 30% of Indian origin. The French navy maintains bases in the UAE, Djibouti as well as in Reunion, with a total of 20,000 forces permanently based in the IOR. In addition, said the official, France is India’s oldest strategic partner, and has conducted India’s first international ‘Varuna’ joint naval exercises since 1983.
•“Therefore, the idea would not be for France to join some other formation, but for others to join what India and France are already doing,” the official said in reply to a question about whether France would consider joining the quadrilateral that met in Manila on November 12. Both the official and Ambassador Ziegler declined comments on the nature of the projects being considered for bilateral cooperation.
•Mr. Drian, who will meet with External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj and other Ministers on Friday, will be in India as part of a series of trips by senior French officials, including the Defence Minister and the National Security Adviser who are preparing for a visit by France’s President Emmanuel Macron in “early 2018.”
📰 Zimbabwe Army seizes power, President Robert Mugabe 'confined to his home'
But not as a part of a multilateral arrangement like the “quadrilateral” between India, U.S., Japan and Australia
•France will like to deepen cooperation with India in the Indo-Pacific bilaterally and not as a part of a multilateral arrangement like the recently convened “quadrilateral” between India, U.S., Japan and Australia, officials said here on Wednesday.
•“We have a growing cooperation in the Indian Ocean, where both India and France have focal positions, and we are in the process of forming a defence and security partnership in the Indo-Pacific,” announced France’s Ambassador Alexandre Ziegler, adding that this new cooperation would be discussed as part of the strategic partnership along with cooperation in counter-terrorism, defence hardware, nuclear energy, and space cooperation during the upcoming visit of Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian to India.
•However, senior diplomats clarified that France and India have a “special and specific” interest in the Indian Ocean, and would prefer to conduct their exchanges across the Indo-Pacific bilaterally. “There is a very strong interest on both sides to keep this bilateral,” a French Embassy official told reporters. “We should not forget that India and France have both a geographical presence as well as a traditional connection of trust in the Indian Ocean,” the official added.
Large territory
•France is the only western country with large territory in the Indian Ocean Region (IOR) including the Reunion Islands, that spans about two million square kilometres of an Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ), and it has a population of one million French Citizens in the region, including about 30% of Indian origin. The French navy maintains bases in the UAE, Djibouti as well as in Reunion, with a total of 20,000 forces permanently based in the IOR. In addition, said the official, France is India’s oldest strategic partner, and has conducted India’s first international ‘Varuna’ joint naval exercises since 1983.
•“Therefore, the idea would not be for France to join some other formation, but for others to join what India and France are already doing,” the official said in reply to a question about whether France would consider joining the quadrilateral that met in Manila on November 12. Both the official and Ambassador Ziegler declined comments on the nature of the projects being considered for bilateral cooperation.
•Mr. Drian, who will meet with External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj and other Ministers on Friday, will be in India as part of a series of trips by senior French officials, including the Defence Minister and the National Security Adviser who are preparing for a visit by France’s President Emmanuel Macron in “early 2018.”
•“We are only targeting criminals around him [Mr. Mugabe], who are committing crimes that are causing social and economic suffering in the country in order to bring them to justice,” Zimbabwe Major General S.B. Moyo, Chief of Staff Logistics, said on national television on November 15. “As soon as we have accomplished our mission, we expect that the situation will return to normalcy.”
•The military detained Finance Minister Ignatius Chombo on November 15, a government source said. Mr. Chombo was a leading member of the so-called ‘G40’ faction of the ruling ZANU-PF party, led by Mr. Mugabe’s wife Grace, that had been vying to succeed Mr. Mugabe.
•Soldiers were deployed across Harare on November 14 and they seized the state broadcaster after the ZANU-PF party accused the head of the military of treason, prompting frenzied speculation of a coup.
•Just 24 hours after military chief, General Constantino Chiwenga, threatened to intervene to end a purge of his allies in the ZANU-PF, a Reuters reporter saw armoured personnel carriers on main roads around the capital.
•Two hours later, soldiers overran the headquarters of the ZBC, Zimbabwe’s state broadcaster and a principal Mugabe mouthpiece, and ordered the staff to leave. Several ZBC workers were manhandled, two members of staff and a human rights activist said.
•Shortly afterwards, three explosions rocked the centre of the southern African nation’s capital, witnesses told Reuters.
•Mr. Mugabe has led Zimbabwe for the last 37 years.
•In contrast to his elevated status on the continent, Mr. Mugabe is reviled in the West as a despot whose disastrous handling of the economy and willingness to resort to violence to maintain power destroyed one of Africa’s most promising states.
•The United States and Britain advised their citizens in Harare to stay indoors because of “political uncertainty”.
•“U.S. citizens in Zimbabwe are encouraged to shelter in place until further notice,” a U.S. statement said. The British Foreign & Commonwealth Office statement told “nationals currently in Harare to remain safely at home or in their accommodation until the situation becomes clearer”.
•The Southern African nation has been on the edge since November 13 when Chiwenga, Commander of the Zimbabwe Defence Forces, said he was prepared to “step in” to end a purge of supporters of sacked Vice-President Emmerson Mnangagwa.
•Only a few months ago, Mr. Mnangagwa, a former security chief nicknamed “The Crocodile”, was favourite to succeed his life-long political patron but was ousted a week ago to pave the way for Mr. Mugabe’s 52-year-old wife Grace to succeed him.
‘Politics over the gun’
•Mr. Chiwenga’s unprecedented statement represented a major escalation of the struggle to succeed Mr. Mugabe, the only leader Zimbabwe has known since it gained independence from Britain in 1980.
•Mr. Mugabe chaired a weekly Cabinet meeting in the capital on November 14, officials said, and afterwards ZANU-PF said it stood by the “primacy of politics over the gun” and accused Mr. Chiwenga of "treasonable conduct... meant to incite insurrection”.
•The previous day, Mr. Chiwenga made clear the Army’s refusal to accept the removal of Mr. Mnangagwa — like the generals a veteran of Zimbabwe’s anti-colonial liberation war — and the presumed accession of Ms. Grace, once a secretary in the government typing pool.
•Local Government Minister Saviour Kasukuwere, a leading figure in her relatively youthful ‘G40’ faction, refused to answer Reuters' questions about the situation in Harare. “I’m in a meeting,” he said, before hanging up shortly before midnight.
•Army, police and government spokesmen refused to answer numerous phone calls asking for comment.
‘Defending our revolution’
•Neither Mr. Mugabe nor Ms. Grace have responded in public to Mr. Chiwenga’s remarks and the state media did not publish his statement. The Heraldnewspaper posted some of the comments on its Twitter page but deleted them.
•The head of ZANU-PF’s youth wing, which openly backs Ms. Grace, accused the Army chief of subverting the constitution.
•“Defending the revolution and our leader and president is an ideal we live for and if need be it is a principle we are prepared to die for,” Youth League leader Kudzai Chipanga said at the party’s headquarters in Harare.
•Ms. Grace’s rise has brought her into conflict with the independence-era war veterans, who enjoyed privileged status in Zimbabwe until the last two years when they spearheaded criticism of Mr. Mugabe’s handling of the economy.
•In the last year, a chronic absence of dollars has led to long queues outside banks and an economic and financial collapse that many fear will rival the meltdown of 2007-2008, when inflation topped out at 500,000,000,000%.
•Imported goods are running out and economists say that, by some measures, inflation is now at 50% a month.
•According to a trove of intelligence documents reviewed by Reuters in 2017, Mr. Mnangagwa has been planning to revitalise the economy by bringing back thousands of white farmers kicked off their land nearly two decades ago and patching up relations with the likes of the World Bank and the IMF.
•Whatever the outcome, analysts said the military would want to present their move as something other than a full-blown coup to avoid criticism from an Africa keen to leave behind the Cold War continental stereotype of generals being the final arbiters of political power.
•“A military coup is the nuclear option,” said Alex Magaisa, a U.K.-based Zimbabwean academic. “A coup would be a very hard sell at home and in the international community. They will want to avoid that.”
📰 Rajasthan conversion Bill returned by Centre
Home Ministry seeks more details
•The Religious Freedom Bill passed by the Rajasthan Assembly in 2008, aimed at banning forcible religious conversions, was returned by the Union government as it deviated from the national policy.
•The Rajasthan government informed the High Court on Tuesday that the Bill was pending with the Centre.
•According to the Union Home Ministry, the Bill was sent back for “further clarifications.”
•The State government has said that it reminded the Centre in June to clear the pending Bill.
•The Bill defined “conversion” as “renouncing one’s own religion and adopting another” through “fraudulent means” or any other “fraudulent contrivance.”
•The Rajasthan government is making attempts to get the President’s nod for the Bill that has been pending since 2008, the year it was passed.
•The State government recently filed an affidavit in the court in response to a notice on a habeas corpus writ petition seeking production of 22-year-old Aarifa, who has converted from her religion and married a Muslim man. The court had asked whether there was any law or procedure in force in Rajasthan that governed conversions.
•The MHA examines Bills passed by the Assemblies that are repugnant to Central laws before they get the President’s assent to become a law.
•BJP president Amit Shah and RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat have batted for “anti-conversion” laws at the national level, but the subject is on the State List of the Constitution and the Centre has no jurisdiction in the matter.
Contentious clauses
•The Rajasthan Dharma Swatantraya Vidheyak was passed by the Assembly in 2008 during the previous stint of Chief Minister Vasundhara Raje. The Bill has provision for prison terms of up to five years. It also contains a clause for cancellation of registration of organisations held guilty of abetting conversions.
•The Bill, which was sent for the President’s approval in 2006 too, was returned by Pratibha Patil.
•A similar Bill of the Chhattisgarh government, Dharma Swatantraya Sanshodhan Vidheyak, 2006, has also been pending with the State.
📰 Green activists hail BS-VI rollout plan
•Environmentalists welcomed the Centre’s decision on Wednesday to advance the rollout of cleaner fuel, compliant to Bharat Stage-VI (BS-VI) norms, in Delhi by two years, but added that a regional approach was needed to make it more effective.
•The Union Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas announced that BS-VI fuel norms would be implemented in Delhi by April 1, 2018, instead of the scheduled deadline of April 2020. For the rest of the country, the earlier deadline would remain.
•Sunita Narain, director general of the Centre for Science and Environment (CSE) and a member of the Environment Pollution (Prevention and Control) Authority, said: “This is the kind of proactive and responsive leadership we need to see in our government. This is also the kind of drastic measure that is required given the scale of the crisis.”
•In a statement, the CSE said that it was ironic that the Petroleum and Natural Gas Ministry had taken the lead instead of the Ministry of Environment and Forests, which is the nodal ministry for environment regulations.
•While the complete gains of the BS-VI norms would only be seen when vehicles also moved from BS-IV to the new norms, the decision to advance the cleaner fuel standards should not be underestimated, said Anumita Roychowdhury, CSE’s executive director and the head of its anti-air pollution campaign. She added that the substantially cleaner fuel would give some emission benefits, but also lead to more advanced emissions control systems being fitted to BS-VI vehicles when they are rolled out.
•For others, the step, though welcome, did not cover a large enough area. With the National Capital Region facing a smog crisis due to a combination of crop burning in Punjab and Haryana and high background pollution in Delhi last week, the need for region-wide action was once again highlighted.
•“We hope the government enacts a more comprehensive and systematic plan. It should be expanded to other mega cities and across Northern India so there can be a more effective reduction of emissions,” said Sunil Dahiya, a campaigner with Greenpeace.
📰 An itinerary in search of a strategy: on Trump's East Asia tour
Donald Trump’s transactional diplomacy during his East Asia tour has only created confusion
•Parsing Donald Trump’s statements and Twitter posts through his 12-day, five-nation tour of Asia — the longest for a U.S. President in 25 years — to decipher a new American strategy towards the region can be taxing unless the idea is to cherry-pick and substantiate pre-existing notions.
‘Terrific’ China
•One can read resistance to China’s expansive ambitions in euphemisms such as ‘freedom of navigation’ and condemnation of ‘predatory’ economic practices, used along with America’s commitment to democracy, human rights, and free trade. When you read them alongside the U.S.-Philippines commitment to “share best practices” to prevent illegal drug use, which is a “problem afflicting both countries”, and Mr. Trump’s desire to be friends with the “short and fat” ruler of North Korea, the emerging picture could appear confusing, if not outlandish.
•In his interactions with reporters as he travelled back, Mr. Trump gave an overview of the “terrific” tour and the new friendships that he has developed, how he enjoyed the unprecedented reception in Beijing, conversations with the“terrific” President Xi Jinping and the special honour he received at the Forbidden City. What topped the list of achievements for him were the business deals — he put the figure at $300 billion and hoped that it would exceed $1 trillion in the coming months, though the actual numbers remain unclear. He said security partnerships with these Asian partners have also been enhanced.
•Ahead of his travel, the White House had said his speech at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) CEO summit in Vietnam would elucidate his vision for the Indo-Pacific region, a term that the Trump administration has started using in a clear acknowledgment of India’s prominence. Administration officials had been emphatic that his speech would demonstrate the U.S.’s continuing commitment to the region. His speech did not live up to the build-up, and may have actually added to the nervousness among traditional U.S. partners. Recalling the U.S.’s historical ties to the region, Mr. Trump said it is time the terms of engagement between these countries and the U.S. changed. In his reckoning, the U.S. has been taken advantage of by all countries and global institutions, particularly the World Trade Organisation (WTO). But he would not blame other countries or their leaders for this situation; it was all the fault of the U.S. administrations that preceded him.
•“Those days are over,” he declared. He was there “to offer a renewed partnership with America,” the basis of which would be “bilateral trade agreements with any Indo-Pacific nation that wants to be our partner and that will abide by the principles of fair and reciprocal trade... I call it the Indo-Pacific dream.”
What does he mean?
•The U.S. has trade deficits with all the five countries that Mr. Trump visited and he told four of them that the U.S. would not tolerate this — putting China, Japan, South Korea and Vietnam in the same basket on this count. In the case of the Philippines, which has a small surplus with the U.S., the relationship is less about trade, he said, but more for “military purposes... it’s called the most prime piece of real estate from a military standpoint.”
•What are the implications of Mr. Trump’s statement that “those days are over?” First, America offers these countries technology, capital and access to its market. Second, America offers a security guarantee and a predictable world order based on multilateral trade and security pacts. China has also been a beneficiary of this system, and the rise of China has added additional buoyancy for neighbouring countries. The friction between China and its neighbours heightened as Beijing’s ambitions grew after the 2008 financial crisis. Vietnam, Philippines, Japan, and South Korea started to gravitate more towards the U.S., which was itself alarmed by the assertiveness of China. The Obama administration announced the Pivot to Asia strategy in response. Kurt Campbell, an Obama official who is credited with drafting the policy, described it as “a multifaceted approach that will involve a strong security component, working with allies, working constructively with China, a commercial dynamic that is about not shipping U.S. [jobs], but U.S. exports and services to Asia; a commitment to building institutions to multilateralism; bringing other partners into Asia, like Europe, working closely with Europe.”
•Like Mr. Trump, Barack Obama also wanted to open the Asian markets for American companies, but there was a broader blue print at play. Mr. Trump has knocked it down to a one-point agenda: buy our goods and services. His statement that countries in the “region [should] be strong, independent, and prosperous, in control of their own destinies, and satellites to no one,” is a call for ending multilateralism. More than a newfound respect for the autonomy of these countries, it reflects American disinterest.
•Mr. Trump also told his Asian hosts that they were free to pursue their interests solo, as he would pursue his. He hinted that America is washing its hands of any leadership role, making it clear that it could cut a deal with China on its own, regardless of its potential impact on other countries. China is the biggest trading partner of South Korea, Japan and Vietnam. Speaking after Mr. Trump at APEC, Mr. Xi presented a case for multilateralism and open trade. China is also willing to offer technology, capital and market access, on its terms under the Belt and Road Initiative.
Security concerns
•Now, what is America offering for the security of these Asian partners? Mr. Trump asked them all to join hands with the U.S. in stopping North Korea’s nuclear adventurism. But that apart, he told Japan, Vietnam and South Korea to buy “our weapons”.
•“We make the best,” he told them and cited how Saudi Arabia was using them effectively. In one Twitter post during the tour, he also gave a carte blanche to the Saudi Arabian regime to chart regional politics.
•Mr. Trump’s “Indo-Pacific dream” may not appear to be much of a dream for most countries in the region. In 2006, Mr. Trump had said he was waiting for a housing market crash, and boasted about his ability to profit from a falling market. Conflicts in Asia, in the west and the east, could appear to be good opportunities for profit from the realtor’s perspective.
•We may be looking for a strategy that does not exist, perhaps. American economist Lawrence Summers, now a Harvard professor, and a key player in the American-led globalisation over the last three decades, described the challenge before America: “…(we) confuse a strategy with a wish list. Our strategy is that it is very important that they open their markets, that it is very important that they cooperate with us on this security issue… Well, that is a good wish list… And I do not think we as yet have a strategy for thinking about the management of the global economic system that is appropriately respectful of the scale and achievements of the Chinese economy.”
📰 After the tsunami: how the 'Quad' was born
How the ‘Quad’ took shape after relief efforts in December 2004
•On the morning after Christmas 2004, the staggering death toll (eventually more than 230,000) from the tsunami was still unknown, when a call from Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa to Indian envoy Nirupama Rao made it clear that island nation needed urgent humanitarian assistance. In Washington DC, Indian Ambassador Ronen Sen was also being asked by the U.S. government how much India could help further afield, as the tsunami had wreaked havoc across the area now called the Indo-Pacific. For India, said a senior official, it was time to show that the Indian Ocean was in fact India’s domain, and India committed in an unprecedented manner to the effort. Within 12 hours, Indian naval helicopters were in Colombo with relief material. By the next day, two Indian naval ships were in Galle and Trincomalee, while three others were despatched to Male. Two more, INS Khukri and INS Nirupak, were converted into hospital ships and sent to the worst hit-country, Indonesia, within days as well. In all, about 32 Indian ships and 5,500 troops were involved in the international relief effort, not to mention the work the armed forces carried out in Tamil Nadu and the Andaman and Nicobar Islands.
India’s effort
•“India’s full capabilities came as a surprise to the world,” recalls Shyam Saran, Foreign Secretary at the time, who received a call from U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, saying the world couldn’t wait, and it was up to the countries of the Indo-Pacific that had naval capabilities of scale to move in urgently. On December 29, U.S. President George W. Bush announced that India, the U.S., Japan and Australia would set up an international coalition to coordinate the massive effort required: to rescue those trapped in the waters, rush relief, and rehabilitate those made homeless, and to restore power, connectivity lines as well as infrastructure like ports and roads. By mid-January the coalition handed over charge to the UN, but while their immediate mission had ended, it led to the birth of a new framework: the Quadrilateral, or Quad. Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe was the first off the block, voicing his long-standing idea of an “arc of prosperity and freedom” that encompassed India, and brought it into a tighter maritime framework, with Japan, the U.S. and Australia, which were already close military allies. The plan for a meeting of the Quad was firmed up when Prime Minister Manmohan Singh visited Tokyo in December 2006.
•Even as the idea grew, however, it encountered growing concerns in Beijing. The idea born of such intense urgency as the tsunami met a lack-lustre end after its meeting in May 2007. Contrary to public perception, Australia wasn’t the first to demur. The U.S. felt that angering China with the Quadrilateral would hamper larger strategic efforts under way, including the move for sanctions against Iran in the UN Security Council, and the six-nation talks on North Korea.
•A decade later, the question is: will the Quadrilateral melt away as before, or is it an idea whose time has finally come?
📰 Money can’t always buy votes
Smaller constituencies and longer campaign periods are essential reforms
•There is a widely held belief that voters in India, especially the poor, sell their votes in exchange for cash, liquor, saris, and many other such goodies. Using evidence from the Uttar Pradesh Assembly elections, we have argued that theories of large scale vote buying (patronage and clientelism) in India are myths (“Death of patronage?”, The Hindu, May 23, 2017). We received several comments from readers, some of whom remain unconvinced that money does not buy votes. They asked, correctly, that if money does not buy votes, why is there a flow of cash and liquor during elections? And why is there an army of brokers at the local level, often aligned with politicians and parties, helping citizens navigate the State?
Probability stakes
•It is indeed true that a candidate with greater resources has a higher probability of winning elections in India. This is true in many other parts of the world, including in the U.S., where a candidate with a larger war chest is more likely to win elections. There is also enough evidence to suggest that the supply of cash and consumption of liquor (and other items such as saris) increases during elections, which is unexplained by a normal rise in demand of these goods.
•In our view, cash flows during elections not to buy votes but rather to support a campaign. Cash is an important grease to run a smooth campaign machinery for a number of reasons. First, parties have weak organisations at the local level and face heavy institutional constraints. Most parties do not have enough committed volunteers to mobilise votes. Money acts as a substitute for the organisation as cash is used to engage vote mobilisers or local individuals who will seek votes for a party and/or candidate. Institutional constraints also make money extremely critical. The Election Commission (EC) allows only 14 days of official campaigning, which ends 48 hours before the scheduled close of polling. The fact that parties do not finalise their nominations for most constituencies until the very end puts pressure on candidates to mobilise votes as quickly as possible. Given the size of constituencies (both in area and the number of voters), a candidate requires an army of workers during the campaign period. Even if a campaign decides to pay the current minimum wage for agricultural labourers to each of its workers during the entire campaign period the candidate would end up exceeding the expenditure limit. To avoid this, candidates spend huge sums of money on cash, liquor and gifts that they hand out to their middlemen.
•Second, money signals resources and power, or access to powerful networks. It allows candidates to mobilise supporters who in turn can pull a crowd together. The role of money as a symbol of power is especially important in a hierarchical society such as India, with the state wielding enormous power. Moreover, in many parts of the country, the display of money during elections is socially approved in certain ways, is a political necessity, and is born of cultural expectations. Voters ask themselves whether someone who has no clout — monetary, political, or familial — can work the levers of administration for them. In most cases, the answer is no. Witness how many independent candidates lose elections in India, and even when they win, it is because of attributes like family legacy, money, and muscle power. This is an important reason why parties perceived as weak stand little chance of winning elections, and why they are likely to wither away even if they do win.
Studying vote banks
•Our arguments find resonance with two outstanding ethnographies of vote banks and local clientelism. In her study of the 2012 Mumbai municipal corporation election, Lisa Björkman wrote that spending of money was not reflected in the vote count. The candidate who spent the most came nowhere near winning the seat, while the candidate who won a landslide victory did so with limited spending. She describes distribution of money as an uncertain investment and a leap of faith on the part of the candidate. Similarly, Mary Breeding in her study on the micropolitics of vote banks in Karnataka quotes a Congress worker: “Voters will take our party’s gift, the other party’s gift, and so on. Then they go into the polling booth and vote however they wish.... I know that many voters find these benefits — liquor, saris, and such — to be very insulting. They vote their minds.”
•Likewise, Philip Oldenburg, who has been studying this question since the 1970s, described a conversation with a Delhi politician who explained to him the role of money and goodies in elections: “Voters basically began to tell politicians that they had to keep the goodies (liquor, cash, and so on) flowing if they wanted their votes. Maybe the politicians would get their votes and maybe they wouldn’t, but they definitely wouldn’t if they didn’t pass out the goodies.”
•What does all of this tell us about the role of money in elections? Cash and goodies do get distributed during elections, but their influence on vote choice is marginal. Competitive populism in Indian politics has led to the development of an “ante-up quid pro quo” system, with politicians and parties forced to put money and goods into the pot before they could play a hand. And this is amplified by weak party organisations, limited campaigning periods and the humongous size of constituencies. Thus, campaign finance reforms should begin by increasing the number of constituencies and the duration of the official campaign period. Smaller constituencies with longer campaigning period are more likely to curb the negative influence of money in politics in comparison to putting a cap on the expenditure limit.
