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Newspaper Terms Simplified for IAS Prelims

Part 9

1. National Party

The Election Commission has recognised the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) as a national party and withdrew the national party status of the All India Trinamool Congress, Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) and the Communist Party of India (CPI).

According to the Election Commission, any of these three conditions need to be met if a party is to be called a "national party".

1. A party's candidates in a minimum of four states must get at least 6 per cent of the total votes polled in each of those states in the last national election. In addition to this, it should have won four seats in the Lok Sabha.

2. A party should win a minimum of 2 per cent of the total seats in the Lok Sabha. The party's candidates should have been elected from not less than three states.

3. A party is recognised as a "state party" in at least four states.

There are many benefits of registering a party. Firstly, the RPA allows political parties to accept contributions voluntarily offered to it by any person or company other than a government company. Apart from this, candidates of registered parties get preference in allotment of election symbols. Other Candidates are identified as independents and do not get preference in symbol allocation.

Registered political parties, in course of time, can get recognition as `State Party’ or National Party’ subject to the fulfillment of the conditions prescribed by the Commission in the Election Symbols (Reservation and Allotment) Order, 1968, as amended from time to time.

If a party is recognised as a State Party’, it is entitled for exclusive allotment of its reserved symbol to the candidates set up by it in the State in which it is so recognised, and if a party is recognised as a `National Party’ it is entitled for exclusive allotment of its reserved symbol to the candidates set up by it throughout India. 

Recognised `State’ and `National’ parties need only one proposer for filing the nomination and are also entitled for two sets of electoral rolls free of cost at the time of revision of rolls and their candidates get one copy of electoral roll free of cost during General Elections. Further they get broadcast/telecast facilities over Akashvani/Doordarshan during general elections. Political parties are entitled to nominate “Star Campaigners” during General Elections. 

A recognized National or State party can have a maximum of 40 “Star campaigners” and a registered un-recognised party can nominate a maximum of 20 ‘Star Campaigners”. The travel expenses of star campaigners are not to be accounted for in the election expense accounts of candidates of their party.

2. Methods of Elections

The methods of elections are given below:

A. First Past the Post System (method followed in India)

• The entire country is divided into 543 constituencies; 

• Each constituency elects one representative; and 

• The candidate who secures the highest number of votes in that constituency is declared elected. 

It is important to note that in this system whoever has more votes than all other candidates, is declared elected. This method is called the First Past the Post (FPTP) system.  This method is also called the Plurality System. 

This is the method of election prescribed by the Constitution.

Suppose a party gets only 25 per cent of the votes in every constituency, but everyone else gets even less votes. In that case, the party could win all the seats with only 25 per cent votes or even less.

B. Proportional Representation

• In the PR system there could be two variations. 

 In some countries, like Israel or Netherlands, the entire country is treated as one constituency and seats are allocated to each party according to its share of votes in the national election. 

 The other method is when the country is divided into several multi-member constituencies as in Argentina and Portugal. Each party prepares a list of candidates for each constituency, depending on how many have to be elected from that constituency. 

 In both these variations, voters exercise their preference for a party and not a candidate. 

 The seats in a constituency are distributed on the basis of votes polled by a party. Thus, representatives from a constituency, would and do belong to different parties.

Comparison of FPTP and PR system of election

3. Election Commission

• Article 324 of the Indian Constitution provides for an independent Election Commission for the ‘superintendence, direction and control of the electoral roll and the conduct of elections’ in India.

• To assist the Election Commission of India there is a Chief Electoral Officer in every state. 

• The Election Commission is not responsible for the conduct of local body elections. The State Election Commissioners conduct it.

Multi-member body

• The Election Commission of India can either be a single member or a multi-member body. Till 1989, the Election Commission was single member. Just before the 1989 general elections, two Election Commissioners were appointed, making the body multi-member. Soon after the elections, the Commission reverted to its single member status. In 1993, two Election Commissioners were once again appointed and the Commission became multi-member and has remained multi-member since then.

• The Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) presides over the Election Commission, but does not have more powers than the other Election Commissioners. 

• The CEC and the two Election Commissioners have equal powers to take all decisions relating to elections as a collective body. 

• They are appointed by the President of India on the advice of the Council of Ministers. It is therefore possible for a ruling party to appoint a partisan person to the Commission who might favour them in the elections.

Security

• The Constitution ensures the security of the tenure of the CEC and Election Commissioners.

• They are appointed for a six-year term or continue till the age of 65, whichever is earlier.

• The CEC can be removed before the expiry of the term, by the President if both Houses of Parliament make such a recommendation with a special majority. This is done to ensure that a ruling party cannot remove a CEC who refuses to favour it in elections. The Election Commissioners can be removed by the President of India.

Special majority means: 

± Two-thirds majority of those present and voting, and 

± Simple majority of the total membership of the House

Functions

• It supervises the preparation of up-to-date voters’ list. It makes every effort to ensure that the voters’ list is free of errors like nonexistence of names of registered voters or existence of names of those non-eligible or non-existent. 

• It also determines the timing of elections and prepares the election schedule. The election schedule includes the notification of elections, date from which nominations can be filed, last date for filing nominations, last date of scrutiny, last date of withdrawal, date of polling and date of counting and declaration of results.

• During this entire process, the Election Commission has the power to take decisions to ensure a free and fair poll. It can postpone or cancel the election in the entire country or a specific State or constituency on the grounds that the atmosphere is vitiated and therefore, a free and fair election may not be possible. The Commission also implements a Model Code of Conduct for parties and candidates. It can order a re-poll in a specific constituency. It can also order a recount of votes when it feels that the counting process has not been fully fair and just. 

• The Election Commission accords recognition to political parties and allots symbols to each of them.