Don't gloat: Why Indian election system is not necessarily better than US

Days after voting in the United States’ election came to a close, the world still does not know who has won. This is not the first time this has happened. It happened, of course, in Florida in 2000 — when Al Gore eventually conceded to George W Bush in December, although the legal challenges to Bush’s election were still alive and well. But even otherwise, the United States takes a very long time to count its votes. 

For Indians, as we are granted so few occasions to gloat about our efficiency that all 1.3 billion of us seize each available opportunity with both hands, this is merely another demonstration of the superiority of Indian democracy. Look at these Americans, we say. They cannot determine who wins their election. Look at us, meanwhile: We are four times the size, and we know within a day. 

This sort of argument is facile, tiresome, and uninformed. There are multiple different reasons why results in American elections take longer to determine, and many of them get to the heart of the differences between American and Indian democracy. It isn’t a simple question of efficiency.

Here is one major difference. The delays in places such as Pennsylvania and Georgia are being caused by the large number of “mail-in ballots” that have been cast this year. Consider this for a moment. Almost half of the voters in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania chose to vote by mail this year. The state government went out of its way to ensure that this option was made available to its voters, to minimise the risk of spreading the pandemic and to ensure as many people as possible voted. These counters are not pressing the button on a machine; they are, wearing protective clothing, opening envelopes and checking postmarks and tabulating scores. I want you to pause for a moment to consider an India that went to such ends to ensure that people voted, instead of using the same processes that have been used since 1952. An India that went to those pains would have as many problems as do Pennsylvania, Arizona, Nevada and Georgia. Probably more. So, no, don’t get arrogant. 

But then, you might hear, we can’t have such systems anyway, because we have electronic voting machines (EVMs). And, yes, the presence of EVMs has changed elections for the better in many ways. It makes the counting quicker, as we know. But it also means that “ballot-stuffing” has become a thing of the past. Some have repeatedly claimed EVMs are hacked; but, even if theoretically possible, nobody has been able to substantiate this claim with real evidence of it happening. Given that, one has to conclude Indian elections are much fairer than they were in the past. 

But they are not more transparent. Counting paper votes — or voting with a verified paper trail — has the advantage of it being possible to double check it in multiple different ways. But, unlike in the US, transparency is not prized in the Indian system. The mobs gathering outside counting centres in some parts of the United States need not even be there; those centres are live-streaming the act of opening envelopes, checking ballots, and enumerating the vote. Transparency does not add to the “efficiency”, some of us in India are trumpeting at the moment; but it is a value that might be worth the costs it imposes. 

In any case, the elections held in the US and those in India are substantively different. Counting the votes on a ballot is not simple. Besides the presidential ticket, there are multiple different preferences a voter must express — over national and state representatives, over local choices, and even for legislations that are being put to a referendum. In India, you as an individual have no choice about where and when to vote. Our system, however, spreads the voting over weeks and months. In many parts of the United States, polling booths are open for weeks — but you can choose when to go. That’s what “early voting” means, and people have chosen to take advantage of this facility so as to maximise social distancing in a pandemic. Which is really more citizen-friendly, precisely? Which system creates greater social efficiency? 

The US has major problems with disenfranchisement of ethnic minorities, of “gerrymandering” or disenfranchisement of certain geographical areas, and with other aspects of their voting system. Yet note that the notion of a violation of voting rights in the US is the demand to see an ID! (This disproportionately affects American minorities and so, some argue, is illegal.) In vast parts of the US, including the states of California and New York, no photo ID is required at a polling booth. Consider the hoops that Indian citizens have to jump through, in comparison, to get to vote. So what, precisely, are we proud of here?