Not My Duty

Intro: In the context of compulsory voting, arguing that it is a citizen’s right not to do his duty is a ridiculous argument. A long time ago, there lived a good king and a wise minister. The King was a benevolent ruler and believed in innate goodness of people. One day, he got into a debate with the minister on the need of rules for people. The king felt one should believe in people’s ability to do right thing for their own good. The minister was more practical and he said, “yes men are good but we need the rules and ways to enforce them, to err is human.” The King asked for evidence. The next day, the minister made an announcement that on the day of Mahashivratri, the king will perform Shiv abhishek using milk contributed by every citizen of the city. The minister urged every citizen to contribute one glass of milk from each household in the huge city tank on the night before Mahashivaratri. When the dawn broke on the next day, the city tank was full of water, no milk.
Every citizen had contributed water, hoping the rest will pour milk and his lapse will go unnoticed. The King accepted the point.
I was reminded of this story last week when I was reading the numerous articles and op-eds by the eminent intellectuals and left-liberals on how the newly passed legislation on compulsory voting in local bodies in Gujarat was against the “democratic right to stay away from voting”; “how we should trust the citizens to do the right thing and not use “force”.
The arguments are clever at best and stupid at worst.
Humanity has lived on this planet for hundreds of thousands of years and the traditional model of governance has been monarchy based. Democracy is a relatively recent and yet evolving model of governance and will continue to evolve. Since the model was born in Europe as a reaction to the oppressive monarchies, the discourse has always been about “rights”. We have the right to vote, right to “pursue Happiness”, right to property, the fundamental rights in our constitution, right to free speech, and many more. Proclaiming loudly about what is a citizen’s right, and what the nation ought to do for the citizen, and being silent on the duty of citizen seems anomalous if not idiotic.
Compulsory voting is a system in which electors are obliged to vote in elections or attend a polling place on voting day.
Democracy is the prevalent model of governance chosen by humanity today, and if it means participation of all to choose their rulers, then it is the duty of every citizen to make it a success. Arguing that it is a citizen’s right not to do his duty is a ridiculous argument.

It is useful to remember the famous shloka in Bhagwad Geeta, “Karmaneyawadhikaraste ma faleshu kadachana.”. If one translates “Karma” as one’s righteous duty, it would mean,” you have the right to do your duty, but not the right to the fruits of the labor, and though you have no right to fruits of labor, you do not have the right to forsake your duty”.
So the traditional indian wisdom has its focus on duty without worrying about results, and the only “right” it talks about is the “right to do your duty”. As against this, the European discourse is about “right to have this” and “right to have that” without proportionate emphasis on the individual duty.
The legislation by Gujarat Government encourages the citizen to perform their duty to choose their ruler. The voter apathy in local elections is a known phenomenon and was the trigger for this legislation. As we have laws on compulsory registration of birth and death, or filing of tax returns, making voting compulsory is definitely a positive step and will reduce voter apathy.
As the Modi government goes about its goal of deploying a governance and policy architecture which is modern, global and practical, while based on indian ethos and universal values, this is a bold and correct step in the right direction.
Yes, the operational details need to be thought through, and it is not easy to implement it, but anything worth doing is always difficult, and the difficulty of completing a task cannot be the reason for not doing it.
Anirudh Joshi (The writer is Bengaluru based and writes on topics of business, technology, and Governance)