BS Number Wise: In Indian elections, the rich win the vote

Politicians own wealth that the people whose support they seek will take decades to earn

Politicians fighting elections in Uttar Pradesh, Manipur, Uttarakhand, Punjab and Goa own wealth that the voters they are wooing probably won’t earn in a lifetime. Candidates who win elections in India are usually richer than their competitors are. It is a disparity troubling for equitable politics.

A median candidate in the five states has assets that would take the average voter more than three decades to earn, shows Business Standard’s analysis of data from the Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR), a Delhi-based research group, and numbers from the Reserve Bank of India.

A median candidate in Goa, the smallest of the states holding elections, has assets worth Rs 1.6 crore: it would take the average voter 36.8 years to earn that much, going by the per capita net state domestic product of Rs 4.4 lakh. It would take 86.8 years in Uttar Pradesh, the largest state. A voter in Manipur will take more than 133 years—the most time among the five states--to match her candidate’s assets as seen in chart 1

A candidate winning elections, going by estimates in the last vote in 2017, had assets that the average voter of the five states will take a century or more to earn. Going by 2017 estimates Uttarakhand voters would take 101.8 years—the least—and those in Uttar Pradesh would need 476.8 years, the most. It was worse in 2012 for Uttar Pradesh (499.8 years) and Punjab (624.2 years). (see chart 2).

It’s not just the disparity between voters and electoral politicians that is worrying. The wealth gap between the median electoral candidate and the eventual winner is widening as well. The median winner in 2007 Goa elections had nearly twice the assets of the median candidate. The ratio increased by 5 in the 2017 elections. The largest gap was in Punjab where the median winner had 11 times the assets of the median candidate in 2017, compared to 3.7 times in 2007 (see chart 3).

To be sure, the disparity between candidates and winners can see reverses, though the general trend seems to go upward. Manipur saw the gap dip from 2.5 to 2 between 2007 and 2012 before rising again to 2.9 in 2017. Punjab’s gap increased to 14.7 in 2012 before falling to 11 in 2017.

The wealth gap is likely to rise, going by the assets of candidates in the five states voting this year. Goa saw a slight dip in median assets of around 12.4 per cent. The rest of the states have seen an increase. The median candidate’s assets have gone up 15.5 per cent in Punjab, 56.7 per cent in Uttarakhand, 96.1 per cent in Uttar Pradesh, and 150.9 per cent in Manipur.

The five states will declare results on March 10. Whoever wins, the wealthy will continue to rule.