In this Moneycontrol article, Priya Vedavalli, Associate, and Avanti Durani, Senior Associate, both based at the IDFC Institute, analyse the election manifestos of the BJP and the INC for the past three election cycles, illustrating how law and order have taken a backseat to other political priorities.
Excerpts below:
“Law and order is one such good, making itself available to each and every person, and is the foremost responsibility of the state towards its citizens. It is critical for delivering good governance, improved quality of life, and inclusive, market-based economic growth.”
“…An examination of the manifestos of the Congress party and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) party over the past three Lok Sabha elections (2009, 2014, and 2019) shows that the delivery of this core public good has not been on the priority list for governments or parties. In their 2019 manifestos, the parties dedicate about 1 percent of the total number of words to describing their police reforms agenda, while about 4 percent is spent on education and 2 percent on health. This, on average, holds true for the 2009 and 2014 manifestos as well. A simple exercise of looking at the number of times certain policing related words are mentioned, such as ‘police’, ‘crime’ and ‘law and order’, reveals that while the attention paid to police reforms has been improving over time, it remains minimal in the larger scheme of things…While the amount of space reserved for discussing police reforms has been low, an analysis of the nature of reforms and ideas is also telling…”
Read the full article here.
Note: This work was done by the author/s when they were a part of the IDFC Institute and is republished here with permission.
