With 8071 candidates contesting 543 seats – that’s an average of 15 candidates for each seat — the 400 million Indian voters who chose to vote sure looked spoilt for choice.
But were they?
Though democracy means choosing who our rulers are going to be, many say there is a crucial missing link in Indian democracy — the lack of inner-party democracy.
This results in the lack of people’s participation especially in choosing candidates, unlike the U.S. where primaries are held by political parties to elect candidates.
Rahul Gandhi says he is trying to make reforms.
At a recent press conference, commenting on his position within the ruling Congress party he said, “It is undemocratic and it is a reality.”
“The Indian political system tends to be related to who you know, who your brother is, who your sister is, and it’s in every single party, in the BJP it exists, in the Congress it exists, that’s a fact of life, that’s the reflection of a closed system.”
