Test of democracy

An important question about the legitimacy of the Naxal movement has been raised by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. He has punctured the basic pretension that Naxalites in this country have long held, that theirs is a popular movement. He has asked them to prove their popularity by joining the electoral process and not through violent and intimidating acts. In doing so, the prime minister has also drawn attention to a paradox that lies at the heart of so many violent movements which claim to represent the people. These movements can do everything but face the people in an open contest.

The political process is often full of shortcomings, and does not unambiguously express the will of the people. But it does not follow from this fact that any group can claim the mantle of representing the people, their needs and aspirations, simply by trumpeting loudly that they are fighting for the people. Even if the grievances that the Naxals draw upon truly exist, their means, methods and policies need to be subject to some test to ascertain their legitimacy. For all its infirmities, electoral democracy is one of the few means of adjudicating any claims to represent the people. If a movement shies away from testing its own legitimacy, it becomes merely self-serving. Its own claims to be fighting for justice, or for the rights of the people, simply become self-confirming assumptions, with no accountability to anyone.

The prime minister is challenging a movement, that claims to be fighting for justice, to subject itself to the test of democracy. In doing so, he is also displaying great confidence in an open political process, by suggesting that the media should be allowed to interact with any political group. But no democracy can and ought to tolerate its own subversion. The subversion is all the more insidious when done in the name of the people. Participating in the democratic process comes with some unavoidable conditions. It requires abjuring violence, it requires respecting the integrity of a political process. The prime minister’s call to the Naxals, therefore, is both a warning that they have to give up violence, and a challenge to them to prove what they claim for themselves — popular support.