My Columns: Without Fear and Favour

Compulsory Voting Bill : Advantages and Pitfalls By Deepak Parvatiyar The Gujarat Governor O.P.Kohli’s assent to a controversial bill that was passed twice by the state assembly but was languishing for five years has sparked furious debate over the citizen’s right to vote across the country. The bill in question – The Gujarat Local Authorities Laws (Amendment) Bil – 2009 – provides voting to be compulsory in local body elections. The same bill stipulates 50 per cent reservation for women in all local body elections. The legislation empowers the state government to take punitive action against the non-voters in local body elections. However,   it was twice returned by Kohli’s immediate predecessor, Dr. Kamla Beniwal, on grounds that the Bill violated the “freedom which a citizen is entitled to enjoy under Article 21 of the Constitution”. She had then advised the Government against entering into “a controversy to compel voters to act against their conscie...

Delhi Assembly Polls : Challenges before the Congress By  Deepak Parvatiyar December 5, 2014 The beleaguered Congress faces an uphill task in Delhi – not just to rediscover its groove but to prevent complete decimation in the ensuing Assembly election in the city-state. The party, which had won just eight of the 70 seats in last year’s Assembly elections, could not even be the runners-up in any of the Assembly segments in the General Elections this summer. Congress Suffering Electoral Setbacks Pan-India However, the poll outcome in Delhi is not an isolated case as the Congress lost almost everywhere, bagging just 44 seats in the last General Elections. Its obituaries are already being written in its citadels, whether Bihar, Maharashtra, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Andhra Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh. The number of such states where the party is now reduced to a rump is ever growing. There has been a split in the party in Tamil Nadu and its prospects...