One nation one election is a big and fore-sighted step of Narendra Modi’s dispensation. It is the demand of the time as Indian progress lags due to the perennial election season in India. Every year at least on two occasions elections were held for different States or UTs in India. These elections were held on schedule and were not out of turn.
India is the largest democracy in the world with the highest number of electorates in the world. India is a diverse country with 28 States and 8 Union Territories. It’s common in India as three to four states or UTs go to elections every year. Due to this electoral cycle, the country always remains in the grip of elections. After the Lok Sabha elections in 2024, Assembly elections were held in Haryana, Maharashtra, and Jharkhand as per the completion of the tenures of these States Assemblies. Elections in the newly created Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir had been conducted as per new schedule.
If we look at the State-wise elections in the last five years then we see that along with the Lok Sabha elections in 2019 voting took place in four States of Andhra Pradesh, Odisha, Sikkim and Arunachal Pradesh in April. After that voting took place in Haryana and Maharashtra in the month of October. In 2019 too the Assembly elections were held in Jharkhand in the month of November.
In 2020 Assembly elections were held in Delhi in February and in Bihar Assembly elections were held in the month of November. The continuous cycle of elections has always kept the political parties vigilant towards the elections throughout the year.
In the year 2021, elections were held in the States of West Bengal, Assam, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, and Puducherry in the months of March and April.
In the year 2022, Assembly elections were held in five States of Uttar Pradesh, Manipur, Goa, Uttarakhand, and in Punjab in February-March, while in Gujarat and Himachal Pradesh Assembly elections were held in November-December.
In the year 2023, elections were held thrice at different times. In February, Assembly elections were held in three states of Tripura, Meghalaya, and Nagaland, while in May Assembly elections were held in Karnataka. Then in the month of November of the same year, elections were held in the States of Rajasthan, Telangana, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, and Mizoram.
In the year 2024, in April-May, Assembly elections were held along with Lok Sabha in the four States Odisha, Andhra Pradesh, Sikkim and Arunachal Pradesh as per 2004,2009, 2014, and 2019 schedule. In the month of October, Assembly elections were held in Haryana and the Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir. In the month of November, elections were called in the States of Maharashtra and Jharkhand.
By these above illustrations we observe that every year a long span of time is spent by the government in conducting elections. Due to the model code of conduct (MCC) restrictions imposed by the Election Commission on the governments that they cannot announce or implement any new important policy. Not only this, but the ruling party hesitates to take any tough step because its party also has to seek the trust of the public in the electoral arena almost twice every year according to the elections. Due to the long duration of elections, the public has to face many problems.
In India, Lok Sabha and State Assembly elections were conducted simultaneously in the years of 1952 and 1957. This cycle was broken in 1959 when Jawaharlal Nehru for the first time-imposed President’s rule in Kerala by toppling the Communist Party government led by Elamkulam Manakkal Sankaran Namboodiripad. After this, elections were held in Kerala in 1960. Due to the weakening hold of the Congress party, non-Congress governments had been formed in many States by the year 1967. Not only this, but due to the increasing incidents of defection, State governments and Assemblies started becoming unstable, due to which it became necessary to conduct Assembly elections of many States separately from the Lok Sabha elections.
There will be many benefits of implementing the practice of one country one election (ONOE). Simultaneous elections will save huge money due to simultaneous elections or ONOE. Multiple kinds of expenditure in the conduct of elections can be settled in one go due to ONOE. The government can utilize that money for public welfare works like schools, roads, hospitals and other works. In the case of ONOE there will be less work pressure on the security forces. The security force personnel can get more time so that they can use it to spend time with their families.
Due to less enforcement of the model code of conduct, the government will be able to spend more time on development activities. Due to Lok Sabha and Assembly elections being held simultaneously, people will be more interested in the voting process and voting percentage will also increase. Due to simultaneous elections, the government will take decisions that have a long-term and good impact on the society instead of immediate benefits. In this situation, political parties will also have to spend less money on election campaigning or on other processes so that small parties will also get a chance to compete with big parties on equal footing. Due to simultaneous elections, the period of implementation of the model code of conduct will be reduced and the government will do more public welfare work.
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