It will be another agni pariksha for Indian democracy. That is something that can be safely predicted will happen from April 11 to May 23 ~ the time-frame announced by the Election Commission for the people to send 543 persons of their choice to the 17th Lok Sabha. Seldom before have the polls been conducted in so vitiated an atmosphere, the polity so polarised, and the political rhetoric so close to invective. That will be an enduring legacy of the last five years, despite all the achievements the government’s spin doctors may project. The burning question before the nation is whether the coming exercise will create the critical healing touch that makes an election a “dance with democracy”, or further drive nails into the coffin of the ideals that had powered the fight for freedom. There is little point in trying to identify who started the rot ~ both the NDA government and the Congress- led Opposition have betrayed the people. Alas, given what are perceived as the key elections of today, the possibilities of a national reconciliation are remote ~ there is no Atal Bihari Vajpayee or Lal Bahadur Shastri on the political firmament to make the people confident that “India’s welfare” is the top priority. With the results that come on May 23, the “losers column” could be more significant than the “winners”. For even if there is a switching of benches in the green chamber of Sansad Sadan it would be pragmatic, not pessimistic, to see more of the same in the immediate future.

Till the time of writing this commentary the political parties had not completed their detailed analysis of the seven-phase poll schedule to offer any blanket endorsement of what Nirvachan Sadan has unrolled ~ a pity that like so many other “institutions” the bona fides of the EC are no longer taken for granted. The decision to defer the election of the next Assembly in Jammu and Kashmir has irked the major parties in the Valley. Yet there would be valid reason to endorse the EC’s line that the law and order situation was not conducive (the Lok Sabha polling in Anantnag would be spread over three days) had there not been such drum-beating over “peaceful” elections to local bodies: Governor’s Rule has proved no magic wand, at last not with the present political personality at the helm. A slap in the face of North Block, and NN Vohra would be entitled to a quiet chuckle. Not that the functioning of others sent to Raj Bhawans is anything over which to go lyrical.

Yet hope must spring eternal: and despite “issues” like nationalism, farm distress, dubious handling of a defence purchase, and the potentially explosive Ayodhya controversy, the people of India would be anxious that the 17th Lok Sabha generates light rather than the divisive heat that has charred the past five years. Over to the voter.