Can one buy an election?
Contrary to popular chatter, there seems to be little or no correlation between the amount of money a party or a candidate has and the likelihood of it winning an election. It is time we consider removing the limits on election expenditure, that has done little to restrain cost of elections. A law that can neither be obeyed nor enforced, is contributing to undermining the legitimacy of democracy, and of politics. Therefore an open election expense law, with no limit but complete disclosure, would be a better idea, I suggest in this article in the Financial Express , on 2 February 2012. There can be no two opinions that Indian elections have become prohibitively expensive. Also, there is widespread apprehension that money is used to unduly influence voters. Despite reams lamenting these threats to democracy, and a constant flow of anecdotal reports in the media, it is really surprising that there is little hard evidence to support such fears. Let us look at some of the evidence and a...