India retains its status as an 'Electoral Autocracy' in 2021 amid rising polarisation

Despite recording an improvement over the previous year, India is yet classified as an Electoral Autocracy for 2021 on V-Dem's Liberal Democracy Index.

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Jitesh Surjiani | 07 Mar '22

In the year 2020, India went from being an “Electoral Democracy” to an “Electoral Autocracy” on the Liberal Democracy Index (LDI). In the 2022 edition of the index released last week for the year 2021, India retains its status as an Electoral Autocracy. It now finds itself amongst the top 10 electoral autocracies in the world, along with Turkey, Serbia, Brazil, Hungary, and Poland.

An autocracy is a state in which one person in the government has absolute power over its administration. An Electoral Autocracy is one where a democratic state’s constitutional machinery is considered broken, and the government has absolute control over the electoral process. This control allows it to considerably shape the outcome of the elections to remain in power.

The last time an autocratic label was assigned to India was during the period of Emergency, where V-dem classified India as a “Complete Autocracy”. During that period, there were no elections, the opposition leaders and members of the press were jailed, and all personal freedoms were curtailed.

Liberal Democracy Index (India) Score - 2021

India's rank improved by 4 places, and it is placed at the 93rd position amongst 179 countries on the Index. India's overall performance level is at 35% in 2021, a marginal rise from the level of 32% in 2020.

As quoted in the Liberal Democracy Index report in Mar 2021, "The world’s largest democracy has turned into an electoral autocracy. Most of the decline occurred following BJP’s victory in India's 2014 elections and their promotion of a Hindu-nationalist agenda." It further states, "Autocratization typically follows a pattern. First, seek to restrict and control the media while curbing academia and civil society. Then couple these with disrespect for political opponents to feed polarization while using the machinery of the government to spread disinformation. Only when you have come far enough on these fronts is it time for an attack on democracy’s core: elections and other formal institutions."

Performance Indicators

The Liberal Democracy Index is a weighted average of 5 sub-indexes with multiple value parameters.

Liberal Democracy Index (India) Indicators - 2021

  • Freedom of Expression has marginally improved from 52% in 2020 to 60% in 2021.
  • 'Clean elections' has marginally improved by 2 percentage points but remains close to its lowest point in the decade.
  • "Equality before the law and Individual Liberty" indicator registered a performance level of 70% in 2021.
  • The "Legislative Constraints on the Executive" indicator registered a performance level of 70% in 2021, a marked improvement over 2020.
  • "Equal Protection" indicator improved by 8 percentage points in 2021
  • The "Equal Distribution of Resources" indicator is at a low of 0.30
  • The "Local Government" indicator is a welcome bright-spot with a performance level of 89% in 2021.

Also read: Historical data and detailed insights on the Liberal Democracy Index

As quoted in the March 2021 report, "Modi and his party have also placed constraints on civil society and have gone against the constitution’s commitment to secularism. Recently, the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) from 1967 and amended in August 2019 is being used to harass, intimidate, and imprison political opponents, as well as people mobilizing to protest government policies."

Comparison with G20 peers

Liberal Democracy Index (India) G20 Comparison - 2021

In comparison to some of its G20 peers, India's overall performance score for 2021 is amongst the lowest with only Turkey, Russia, and China below it on the Index. India's overall performance in Liberal Democracy is even lower than the world average of 39%. Sweden maintains its pole position at the top of the list with a score of 0.88.

Government’s views

The ruling NDA government has never acknowledged the findings of V-Dem’s report. It has accused V-Dem of basing its observations on the opinions of only a handful of people from each country to classify a complex nation such as India. Many within the government regard the report as nothing but mathematically modeled data that is out of touch with India’s true state of affairs.

The government considers such exercises only as a propaganda tool of the ‘left-liberals’ intent on defaming the Modi-led government. What you make of the information, is left entirely at your discretion.


Reference Reading

What is the Liberal Democracy Index (LDI)?

The Liberal Democracy Index published by V-Dem reflects both the liberal and electoral principles of democracy. The V-Dem Institute is an independent research institute, and the Headquarters of the project is based at the Department of Political Science, University of Gothenburg, Sweden. Involving over 3,000 scholars and other country experts, V-Dem measures hundreds of different attributes of democracy. V-Dem enables new ways to study the nature, causes, and consequences of democracy embracing its multiple meanings.

The combination of all the sub-indexes that comprise the LDI captures amongst other elements, the extent to which regimes hold clean, free and fair elections, their actual freedom of expression, the degree to which government policy is vested in elected political officials. It also measures to what extent all social groups enjoy equal capabilities to participate in the political arena.

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Jitesh Surjiani

Jitesh Surjiani

Jitesh Surjiani is passionate about progressive change for India and its citizens. He writes about issues that are roadblocks in improving quality of life and interpersonal interactions as well as areas of public governance that fall short in intent and action.

India retains its status as an India retains its status as an 'Electoral Autocracy' in 2021 amid rising polarisation
India retains its status as an 'Electoral Autocracy' in 2021 amid rising polarisation
India retains its status as an 'Electoral Autocracy' in 2021 amid rising polarisation 0 min left

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