By Subrata Mukherjee
In love with Golapi, Subratagolapi.
Democracy is perhaps the noblest concept of the administration for or on behalf of the common people in the modern day human civilization. Democracy is a form of government in which the supreme power is vested in the people and exercised by them directly or indirectly through a system of representation in the format of elections.
The word democracy has come from the French source ‘Democracie’ or ‘Democratie’ borrowed from Greek word ‘Demokratia’. Demokratia consists of two words ,’Demos’ means people and ‘Kratos’ means rule, therefore, it is rule of the people. Democracy can be a direct democracy or an indirect democracy.
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Direct democracy:
A direct democracy is a form of pure democracy in which the people are involved directly in the formation and running of the Government and also in the administration.
Indirect democracy:
It is a form of democracy where the people take part in the process and functions of Government through their elected representatives.This type of democracy includes:
A. Electoral democratic system…….a representative democracy based on election.
B. Dominant party system……a party rules the form of the Government through the system in coalition or representation.
C. Parliamentary democracy…..which is run by the cabinet headed by the prime minister elected through the process of voting or general elections modelled after Westminster democracy.
D. Presidential democracy…..where the head of the state is also the head of the Government and Executive separate from the Legislature modelled after Jacksonian democracy.
E. Totalitarian democracy …..in which the representatives take part in the process and functions of the Government and the citizens have very little role to play in the functioning of the Government.
In the forms of democratic system of government there are certain specific advantages for the people in those countries where such democracy has been established. These are:
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1. Protection of the interest of the citizens and their democratic rights.
2. Established democratic system prevents autocratic and despotic whims and wills of the Executive and the Legislatures.
3. Democracy promotes equality, rule of law and a free and fare administration of justice for the welfare of the common people.
4. Democracy helps in the establishment of a stable and accepted form of government which has the support and ratification from the majority of the people.
The term democracy probably appeared in the 5 th century BCE to denote the political system in Greece contrast to the rule of an elite or aristocracy. Though in origin, the object and functions of the democratic system of government was in contrast to autocratic or despotic form of government but in due course of time this sharp contrast has become blurred and obtuse as the modern world is experiencing a mixture of democratic or oligarchic form of governments coupled with despotic ideas and descision from the governments.
In the United Kingdom:
Westminster system of democratic government paves the way to the parliamentary sovereignty prevailing with the existence of judicial independence.
In the United States:
Separation of powers is a great attribute besides such properties of democracy in the United Kingdom.
In India:
Parliamentary democracy and sovereignty is subject to the constitution of India and judicial review has been earmarked as one of the basic features of Indian concept of democracy.
Parliamentary democracy is a form of representative democracy where the government is elected and appointed by the representatives of the people through universal adult suffrage and even the representatives can be substituted by the people through the process and power of their voting unlike the presidential form of democracy where the president is both the head of the state and the head of the government and is directly elected by the voters of the country and his substitution is not so easy.
In the parliamentary democracy, functions of the government is executed by the delegates of the people represented on their behalf, headed by the prime minister who is the real head of the country and is accoutable to the people for his acts conducted in the framework of the government.
The seed of democracy lies in the faith of the people reposed on their representatives who are elected on their behalf to do work for the interest of the common people but in our modern times democracy has come under various doubts and confusions owing to dilution of faith and fermentation of mistrust generated in the process and functions of the representatives and their neglectful approach to the noble platform of democracy.
This cloud of doubts and dilemmas has gone many miles as the true sense of democracy has not been exposed yet and the will of the majority of the people coming as mandates has been wilfully neglected by the greedy mongers who infiltrated in to the democratic system and applied their evil motives to destroy the whole version of a the most accepted concept of government.
The rich, the powerful, the greedy leaders took advantages of the simple equation of democracy and rather used the entire system in their own cause and own benefit. The trajectory of democracy has gone the other way resulting the rich to be richer and the poor to be poorer and a whole framed exploitation has tightened the neck of democracy, as a result, no voice for the interest and benefits of the poor and the common people is heard in the loudest form which should have been realised in the concept of democracy.
“Democracy cannot exist solely of elections that are nearly always fictitious and manged by the rich landowners and the professional politicians!”……..Che Guevara.
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Inefficiencies of democracy:
In the democratic system of government the common people who take part in the election of their representatives do not have all the necessary information related to the proper functioning of the country. They are either swayed by the hype of populist opinion or carried away by the movements of the strong waves and in most of the cases these trends in the democratic system have been proved as the lethal drawbacks of the system.
In such situations the elected government is just a populist form of establishment set up by the quantities of the people and there are fewer chances of knowledge and competence of the people about the future of the Government.
Neither in scientific mode nor in applications of process, quantitative majority emerged as the correct and accepted versions of a better governance for the causes of the people. This may create a loophole in the system and the fake and the fraud have enough opportunities to take advantages from the environment.
Besides, the democratic system has instability and volatility in its foundation. Frequency of elections and the participation of the illiterate people in the democratic system have destroyed the objective of the democracy. The quantity of illiteracy and ignorance of the people supersede the qualitative talents and informed well educated people and the country is ruled by inefficient masses who lack vision and farsightedness in their thought and action.
As a result the purity of democracy gets diluted with the version of impure elements in the open forum of democracy.
Democracy is a government of the people for the people and by the people ……. Abraham Lincoln.
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……To be continued.
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