Countering hate, electoral reform, democratization way forward: Civil society

Bengaluru, NT Bureau: Civil society members advocate for a push-back against communal hate online, electoral reform and sensitisation of the masses to cement what they see as gains made in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.

The speakers included senior lawyer Prashant Bhushan, retired judge Nagmohan Das, Eddelu Karnataka Central Working Group Tara Rao and Director of Acura Hospital Dr Mohammad Taha Mateen.

They made the remarks at a talk entitled “Mandate of 2024 Parliamentary Elections – The Way Forward” organised by the Forum For Democracy And Communal Amity – Karnataka Chapter (FDCA-K) at the Dar Us Salam Building on Queen’s Road in Bengaluru on Saturday.

They were referring to Prime Minister Narendra Modi-led BJP juggernaut being reduced to 240 seats, falling short of the 272 majority mark. Its National Democratic Alliance (NDA) partners helped it reach 293 seats.

Congress bagged 99 seats and the Indian National Developmental Alliance (INDIA) secured 234 in all. The speakers argued that voters had gravitated towards “politics of livelihood” and away from “emotive issues” like Hindutva.

Elections weren’t fair: Prashant Bhushan

Prashant Bhushan claimed there was no level-playing field in the general elections since the BJP had more money and support from the Election Commission, adding that Congress’ bank accounts were frozen by the Income Tax Department.

Bhushan hailed the emergence of “independent” digital news media. “BJP has a troll army of paid people. We can create a truth army of unpaid volunteers, who are just civil society activists. They will organise themselves to debunk fake news and spread the right kind of news,” Prashant said.

“In order to confront communalism, we need to create communal harmony councils in every district, in every major city. These should consist of senior and respected people from different communities. Their job should be to organise programmes where influential members of different communities are able to interact with each other,” he said.

Bhushan also argued against the first-past-thepost system where candidates with the highest number of votes win. “We need to have proportional representation in our electoral democracy so that a party that gets two per cent vote gets two per cent MPs or MLAs. Today, a party getting two per cent vote gets zero,” he said.

“We need to have public funding for elections. We need to control election expenditure in a more effective manner. There are candidates who are spending more than Rs 100 crores for their election even though the limit is less than Rs 1 crore,” he added.

Educate people on democracy: Nagamohan Das

Nagamohan Das argued that sensitising people to democratic ideals was essential.

“About five and a half years ago, I wrote a book. We went to the people of the state and launched a movement. People like Pir Basha and Umesh who are here today had accompanied me. We travelled the state. What we saw was that there was a hunger in the people of the state to understand the constitution. They want to know but there is no one to help them,” he said, adding that we should start by educating ourselves.