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Journalism of Courage
Before seeking opinion from the public for their manifestos,parties should listen to their own.
As it prepares its manifestos for various assembly elections and the Lok Sabha election next year,the Congress has decided to tap into the wisdom of the crowd,soliciting ideas from the public. Apart from a website where users can make suggestions,there will also be a series of town hall meetings across India,from where interesting ideas can find their way into the manifesto after public consultation. The BJP also has a section on its website where people can send ideas. The underlying boast,of course,is that these parties are vessels for the popular will,that they respond instantly to the specific desires of citizens. At the extreme end is the Aam Aadmi Party,which is preparing 70 different manifestos for each constituency,claiming to derive its platform entirely from what the people want.
Parties are,in fact,instruments for the popular demands to express themselves,but not through suggestion forms and questionnaires every five years. Parties like the Congress and the BJP remain opaque about the selection of candidates and platforms,as is evident from the ongoing ticket distribution in five states. A clutch of top leaders take the key decisions,which makes the organisation slower to respond to new mobilisations,and blocks new information from travelling up. Decisions within parties are not taken on the basis of ideas,but of influence and intrigue,because of the lack of a formal and transparent procedure to rise within the organisation. Without genuinely open mechanisms of consultation within parties,it makes little sense to enact openness through crowdsourced manifestos.
