Indian democracy is the politics of superlatives. Everyone knows that India, with nearly a billion registered voters, is the world's largest democracy. Few realise that, with an annual income per capita of less than Rs 2.62 lakh (US $ 3,000) in 2024, it is also the world's poorest. Or at least: it is by far the world's poorest country to be able to boast of more than a few decades of competitive elections under the rule of law with routine transfer of power between competing parties. India has been a democracy of some kind ever since it became an independent country in 1947, and it has been unambiguously a liberal democracy since the end of the 21-month 'Emergency' of 1975-1977. The only other non-Western country that comes close to matching India's record of free and fair elections is Japan, where democracy was imposed by American forces after 1945. By contrast, India's democracy is entirely home-grown. That said, much of the Western political science profession now believes that India is not a democracy. The leading democracy-rating organisation, Sweden's Varieties of Democracy Institute, categorises India as an 'electoral autocracy." Princeton University's Ashoka Mody believes that Indian democracy began 'unraveling under its first Prime Minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, went into a 'death spiral in the 1970s under his daughter Indira Gandhi (no relation to the Mahatma), and 'veered into dangerous territory' in the 1980s and 1990s before the current Prime Minister, Narendra Modi, 'mounted a merciless assault on democracy' after taking office in 2014. Christophe Jaffrelot of Sciences Po in Paris characterises 'Modi's India' as an 'authoritarian vigilante state. The University of Sydney's Debasish Roy Chowdhury and John Keane call India an 'elective despotism,' writing that 'with power-sharing democracy on its knees, blindfolded, elections prove useful to its killers." Oxford University's Maya Tudor asks 'has India really departed the shores of democracy?' and answers with the one word: 'yes." For most of India's on-the-ground political commentators, things are not so dire. The Berkeley-educated Indian policy analyst Rahul Verma objects to the prevailing international consensus, arguing that 'claims of Indian democracy's death are highly exaggerated' and labelling accusations like those cited above as 'an injustice to India's journey as a democracy." India's most prominent liberal political journalist, Shekhar Gupta, asked that 'all those who said India's democracy was dead and buried, over, that we were no-hopers under fascist rule, please sit down and drink Kool-Aid. He apparently misinterpreted the American idiom. India's most prominent journalistic critic of Narendra Modi, Rajdeep Sardesai, believes that 'the 2024 elections must be seen as arguably the most unfair election in the history of Indian politics, but that nonetheless, 'the humble voter could hold powerful politicians to account." And India's most prominent opposition politician, Rahul Gandhi, quite sensibly said after the 2024 elections that: The fight for democracy in India is an Indian fight. With all due respect, it has nothing to do with anybody else. It's our problem. And we'll take care of it. We will make sure that democracy is secure, 10 to The Gandhi family scion is correct: India's democracy has always been India's fight. The widespread myth that India inherited its democracy from England is belied by the fact that India is the only one of the United Kingdom's major colonial possessions that became and remained a democracy. It is true that India's representative institutions were modelled on the British parliamentary system. But so, too, were the constitutions of Pakistan, Sri Lanka, and Myanmar, all of which emerged out of the British Empire in South Asia. Pakistan inherited a British constitutional legacy that was nearly identical to that of India, along with the Indian Civil Service and the British Indian Army, both of which were split in two to form the modern state institutions of India and Pakistan. Yet within two years of independence, Pakistan became officially an Islamic republic. It experienced its first military coup in 1958. Pakistan didn't hold proper elections until 1970, and when it did, the country erupted into civil war. If things have turned out differently in India, the credit must go to the leaders who shaped the country's understanding of itself as a unified political community. Highly literate political activists like Jawaharlal Nehru, Rajendra Prasad, BR Ambedkar, V D Savarkar, Subhas Chandra Bose, V K Krishna Menon, and the 'father of the nation.
India's democracy evokes strong opinions and reactions, yet the truth rarely fits the extremes. While international observers frequently sound alarms about the direction India is heading, many within India view these judgements as overstated or inattentive to the country's unique political landscape. Between these contrasting perspectives lies a more measured story-one of a vast, plural society negotiating modern democratic life with all its tensions, traditions, and upheavals through the prisms of religion, caste, ancient dharmic values and its rapid surge ahead on the road to technological advancements and modernity.
In this thoughtful and meticulously researched book, Salvatore Babones brings clarity to a debate on Indian democracy and the reasons it has survived for more than seven decades. Using comparative data and original historical analysis, he situates India within both global democratic standards and its own long institutional journey. Rather than offering simple praise or criticism, Babones reveals a system that is imperfect yet robust, pressured yet adaptive and deeply rooted in dharma. Salvatore Babones is an associate professor of sociology at the University of Sydney.
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