With May 16 fast approaching, the media is gearing up for its 24/7 coverage of the Lok Sabha election results. Television anchors and psephologists will passionately analyse each election number and talk about vote swings.
Among the more popular theories that will be used again and again is the strong correlation between anti-incumbency and high voter turnout. That is, if there is a higher voter turnout, it means people are dissatisfied with the existing government and have come out in numbers to replace it. Even political parties, when it suits them, will go along with these theories. And television anchors? They will flash breaking news with the ‘I-told-you-so look’ (some will even say it).
Till now, there has been a higher voter turnout of 8.6 per cent for the 438 seats in which voting has taken place. There are already some headlines like: “Higher voter turnout favourable for BJP:Expert’. But is the answer so easy?
Back testing this theory through a recent report by Bank of America Merrill Lynch gives a mixed picture.
In the ten elections between 1977 and 2009, the rise or fall in voter turnout (in percentage terms) is equally divided at five each. But the incumbent has been replaced 7 times while it has been retained 3 times. There have been hung Parliaments and some ‘mili-juli sarkars’ (bunch of parties coming together to form governments) have got support by BJP and Congress.
Interestingly, out of the three times that governments have retained their position, the Congress in 1984 (after the Indira Gandhi assassination, the growth was highest at 6.64 per cent) and UPA in 2009, the voter turnout was higher. In 1999, when the NDA (BJP-led) retained their government, the voter turnout was less.
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When the BJP-led NDA coalition replaced the United Front government (supported by the Congress) in 1998, there was a higher voter turnout by slightly-over 4 per cent.
The report does not give such detailed data on state elections, as it looks at the last five years’ election data. But, again, the results are similar – there is no clear trend. In UP, voter turnout went up 13.5 per cent when Samajwadi Party replaced Bahujan Samajwadi Party. But in Gujarat and Bihar, the situation is reverse. Rise in voter turnout by 11.55 and 7.11 per cent retained incumbent governments.
In many states, voters showed significantly more interest in state elections vis-a-vis the 2009 Lok Sabha elections. In some states like Chattisgarh, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Gujarat, 10-23 per cent more voters participated in the state electoral process.
Given the non-performance of UPA, corruption charges and lack of a credible face, analysts and psephologists may be completely right about an NDA win.
But as a recent analysis by the Times of India points out that only 22 MPs in 2009 won with more than 50 per cent votes cast. Clearly, high voter turnout may not be the right parameter to predict election results.