Why India needs a new law to stop defections

India is socially diverse, but our politics is strangely homogeneous. Ideological differences between rival parties seem to matter not a jot. Legislators regularly and smoothly switch sides. In the 1970s, it could be said that all parties were mostly fifty shades of red, today all parties seem to be fifty shades of saffron.A week is a long time in politics goes the adage for British politics. In India, a week can be an eternity. Until late June, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) had been regularly denouncing the corruption of the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) in irrigation and co-operative bank scams. Yet on July 2, Ajit Pawar of NCP, accused by his political opponents of involvement in both scams, was sworn in as deputy chief minister in a BJP-Shiv Sena alliance government. Ajit Pawar shares this post with former BJP chief minister Devendra Fadnavis who, in 2019, had vowed to dispatch Ajit Pawar to “chakki peesing” in jail. Ahead of general elections, this compromise seems to have been undertaken to bolster the ruling BJP’s strength in the 2024 battle.Such trade-offs have a long history. In 2019, the Congress, which had dubbed Shiv Sena’s Bal Thackeray as a symbol of hate politics, moved to tie up with it and form the Maha Vikas Aghadi government. But such compromises are not unique to Maharashtra. In Tamil Nadu, as leader of the Opposition, DMK chief MK Stalin had called for the arrest and jailing of V Senthil Balaji, the then AIADMK minister. Today chief minister Stalin supports Senthil Balaji, now in the DMK, remaining a minister without portfolio while still in jail. ShowBlurbsThe rise of large-scale and rather immoral defections began when Indira Gandhi returned to office in 1980. In the same year, Haryana chief minister Bhajan Lal defected with almost the entire Janata Dal to the Congress (I). But the tide has turned. Once politicians beat a path towards the Congress, today most seem headed to the BJP. The chaotic defections of the 1980s led to the anti-defection law of 1985, but this is no longer adequate to curb the Aaya Ram-Gaya Ram phenomenon.Under this law, legislators who split parties can escape disqualification if they have support from two-thirds of the party. Wholesale defections are thus legitimised. Though individuals who switch parties must resign and seek re-election, this is no deterrent. Given the resources and money-power that MLAs command, re-election is guaranteed. In 2019 in Karnataka when Congress MLAs resigned and brought down the H D Kumaraswamy government, a majority were re-elected.The Association for Democratic Reforms reveals that as many as 222 (20%) Congress candidates switched loyalties during the elections between 2014-2021 as compared to 111 (9.8%) who left the BJP. ShowBlurbsThere are several reasons for the spike in defections. First, BJP’s near-total dominance in politics. Second, pressure from central investigative agencies and the so-called “washing machine” syndrome that washes away the taint of those who defect. Third, family or individual strangleholds in parties leading to ambitious MLAs having no choice but to exit the party so that they can ascend the ladder in other parties, and four, the murky transactional-ism that has replaced ideology. Labels like secular, communal, corrupt, leftist or rightist are hanging like fragments of neglected laundry on a threadbare clothesline called ideology.At the core of this unparalleled defection culture is cash-and-carry politics where every MLA/MP wants to be on the winning side. The lure of the lal batti (or the white Innova with the flashing red light) is very strong. A ministership gives access to state resources, convoys, police and officials. Sweeping into a poll rally with a convoy of cars and commandos is altogether more impressive than simply trundling around in a solitary opposition vehicle.This culture of defections may destroy India’s democracy itself because it makes the party system meaningless. High-profile defectors walk away with plum posts, while old-time party loyalists are demoralised. Voters are held captive to a capricious but powerful MLA or MP who stands for nothing beyond self-interest. A new law, laying down that a period of five years must elapse before defectors get ministerships, could disincentivise India’s industry of defections. Citizens must speak up too and not simply watch politics as spectator sport, as we then become complicit in our own powerlessness. At the very least, the voter must punish political defectors. If ‘deal-making’, power-hungry netas won’t do it, will voters at least not reward those who betray the mandate?