India takes pride in being the talent capital of the world. CEOs of tech giants like Microsoft, Google, and Adobe have Indian roots.
The global stage is filled with Indian-origin leaders in politics, business, and innovation. Our IT professionals are the backbone of tech ecosystems worldwide.
We are proud exporters of talent. But while we lead abroad, back home, something feels broken.
The foundation of any democracy is free and fair elections. Yet, in India, every election brings more questions than answers.
Despite so much technological advancement, our electoral process still leaves many citizens in doubt. Allegations, glitches, and delayed result announcements continue to raise eyebrows.
Take Maharashtra. After the BJP received a cold response in an election, its alliance with Shiv Sena in subsequent election suddenly swept the elections in 2024, within a gap of four months. Wouldn't that look suspicious?
A similar surprise happened in Andhra Pradesh, where the NDA defeated YSRCP with a massive margin - something even pro-NDA voters didn’t expect.
A belief is growing that if you're in alliance with the BJP, victory is more likely; at least in most states, if not in Kerala or Tamil Nadu.
Some people say that if there was manipulation, the ruling alliance would have won in every state. Since they didn’t, it makes others think the manipulation might be happening only in selected states, which is used as evidence to dismiss or avoid the allegations of manipulation.
Rahul Gandhi, the opposition leader, and few others have been accusing the Election Commission of voter list manipulation, showing several proofs. Such accusations deepen public mistrust.
When some people close to power get bail easily while others remain in jail for months, the line between democracy and dictatorship blurs.
In Andhra Pradesh, there were reports of voter slips being burned before the allowed time, after the conclusion of 2024 General Elections.
An EVM allegedly recorded YCP votes as BSP votes due to a "technical glitch", which was later corrected. If true, how many such machines were out there? No one knows.
In 2019, it was Chandrababu Naidu raising the alarm over EVM misuse. In 2024, it’s YSRCP. Are the losers just making noise? Or is something actually wrong? What is to be underlined is that unbelievable huge margin of defeats are raising doubts.
Nothing is conclusively proven. But the growing cloud of suspicion is in itself dangerous. If the Supreme Court and other institutions stay silent, and the Election Commission avoids transparency, people lose trust.
And when trust disappears, democracy suffers - not just on paper, but in people’s hearts. For the world’s largest democracy, that’s a serious crisis.
Kiran Sharma
Disclaimer: These are the personal opinions of the author
