Editorial: Well Done, Independents

Irrespective of how they fare when the EVMs churn out the results on Monday, the Independent candidates who have managed to get their symbols registered on the electronic voting machines for the panchayat level elections today deserve thanks and congratulations for having delivered where the collective flock in the Opposition camp have failed.
Participatory democracy requires mandate, and walkovers, as the opposition parties concede routinely in grassroots elections, are not healthy. The Opposition was demolished in the last Assembly and Lok Sabha elections, but the drubbing, instead of making them work harder to reconnect with the people, seems to have pushed them even further away, taking their political battles to the courts instead of among the people. And while they were busy politicking in the capital, the municipal elections passed without their participation, and now, the panchayats too have gone that way. Even if one were to excuse the shying away from the urban body elections to it having come too early in the present Government’s latest term in office, how does one explain the Opposition’s failure to still arrive at a position where it can go to the people for votes? And to now claim the Independents as their own is not only factually incorrect, but also disrespectful of the spine and commitment that the Independent candidates have displayed. The Opposition justification that they are boycotting the panchayat polls in protest against its party-based format and perceived discrepancies in the voter lists, are fig leaves which everyone can see through. Meanwhile, a substantial number of the Independents in the fray are overlooked ruling Front ticket aspirants and the rest genuine Independents – people who have taken the leap on their own and if they have received any support from Opposition groups, it has been opportunistic because it has come after they remained in the fray even after the last date for withdrawal of nomination forms. Not all of them are challenging the ruling party and most are essentially in the fray either because they believe they can work better for their village or because they want to themselves participate in grassroots democracy and want fellow villagers to have a choice. There are also many instances where Independents are contesting because they believe the previous representatives failed them and the party/ MLA hierarchy has refused to make amends. Even here, the decisions are very localised in nature and the Opposition response [over the years] has proven that this is not the level of local they can get to. May be the rough and tumble of panchayat elections and the sheer number of candidates required present a logistic impossibility for them, but that is their own failing and a disconnect which explains their continued failing in the hustings.
Given this scenario, the Independents, with their record participation this time deserve the collective gratitude of the Sikkimese people for keeping panchayat elections relevant. Very few of them will win the elections, but they have all already succeeded by registering their participation, and that, as mentioned earlier, is more than what leaders who find frequent mention in newspapers with their press releases have delivered to the people of Sikkim. For the record, there are 648 Independent candidates in the panchayat fray – 535 for panchayat ward elections and 113 for the Zilla Panchayat polls.