Political parties

Political Party
• A political party is a group of people who come together to contest elections and hold power
in the government. They agree on some policies and programmes for the society with a view
to promote the collective good.
• Parties reflect fundamental political divisions in a society. Parties are about a part of the
society and thus involve PARTISANSHIP.
Components of Political Parties
• The leaders,
• The active members
• The followers
Functions of Political Parties
1. Parties put forward different policies and programmes and the voters choose from them.
2. Parties play a decisive role in making laws for a country.
3. Parties form and run governments.
4. Those parties that lose in the elections play the role of opposition to the parties in power, by
voicing different views and criticising government for its failures or wrong policies.
5. Parties shape public opinion. They raise and highlight issues.
6. Parties provide people access to government machinery and welfare schemes implemented by
governments. Parties have to be responsive to people’s needs and demands.
Why do we need Political Party?
• Every candidate in the elections will be independent. So no one will be able to make any
promises to the people about any major policy changes.
• The government may be formed, but its utility will remain ever uncertain.
• Elected representatives will be accountable to their constituency for what they do in the
locality.
• No one will be responsible for how the country will be run.
• The rise of political parties is directly linked to the emergence of representative democracies.
• As societies became large and complex, they also needed some agency to gather different
views on various issues and to present these to the government.
• They needed some ways, to bring various representatives together so that a responsible
government could be formed.
• They needed a mechanism to support or restrain the government, make policies, justify or
oppose them.
• Political parties fulfil these needs that every representative government has.
Types of Political Parties
 Single Party System
• It is a system in which only one party is allowed to control and run the government. Like
China etc.
• We cannot consider one-party system as a good option because this is not a democratic
option.
• Any democratic system must allow at least two parties to compete in elections and provide a
fair chance for the competing parties to come to power.
Two Party System
• In two party system power usually changes between two main parties.
• Several other parties may exist, contest elections and win a few seats in the national
legislatures.
• But only the two main parties have a serious chance of winning majority of seats to form
government. Such as in the UK, the USA.
Multi Party System
• In multi party system, several parties compete for power, and more than two parties have a
reasonable chance of coming to power either on their own strength or in alliance with others.
• Coalition Government: It is a system when no party gets majority after election. So, various
parties join their hands to form the Government.
• Alliance or Front : In this various political parties join their hands before the election. They
contest the election on common minimum program.
Factors that effect the Party System
• Party system is not something any country can choose.
• It evolves over a long time, depending on the nature of society, its social and regional
divisions, its history of politics and its system of elections.
• These cannot be changed very quickly.
• Each country develops a party system that is conditioned by its special circumstances.
National and Regional Parties
• The Election Commission has laid down detailed criteria of the proportion of votes and seats
that a party must get in order to be a recognised party.
• A party that secures at least six per cent of the total votes in an election to the Legislative
Assembly of a State and wins at least two seats is recognised as a State party.
• A party that secures at least six per cent of the total votes in Lok Sabha elections or Assembly
elections in four States and wins at least four seats in the Lok Sabha is recognised as a
national party.
Parties and Their Ideologies
Indian national Congress:
One of the oldest parties of the world. Founded in 1885.
A centrist party (neither rightist nor leftist) in its ideological orientation, the party espouses
secularism and welfare of weaker sections and minorities. Supports new economic reforms but with a
human face.
Bhartiya Janta Party
• Founded in 1980 by reviving the erstwhile Bharatiya Jana Sangh, formed by Syama Prasad
Mukherjee in 1951.
• Cultural nationalism (or ‘Hindutva’) is an important element in its conception of Indian
nationhood and politics.
• Wants full territorial and political integration of Jammu and Kashmir with India, a uniform
civil code for all people living in the country irrespective of religion, and ban on religious
conversions.
All India Trinamool Congress (AITC)
• Launched on 1 January 1998 under the leadership of Mamata Banerjee.
• Recognised as a national party in 2016.
• The party’s symbol is flowers and grass.
Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP)
• Formed in 1984 under the leadership of Kanshi Ram.
• Seeks to represent and secure power for the bahujan samaj which includes the dalits,
adivasis, OBCs and religious minorities.
• It stands for the cause of securing the interests and welfare of the dalits and oppressed
people.
Communist Party of India (CPI)
• Formed in 1925. Believes in Marxism-Leninism, secularism and democracy.
• Opposed to the forces of secessionism and communalism.
• Accepts parliamentary democracy as a means of promoting the interests of the working class,
farmers and the poor.
Communist Party of India - Marxist (CPI-M)
Founded in 1964. Believes in Marxism-Leninism.
Supports socialism, secularism and democracy and opposes imperialism and communalism.
Accepts democratic elections as a useful and helpful means for securing the objective of socio-
economic justice in India.
Nationalist Congress Party (NCP)
• Formed in 1999 following a split in the Congress party.
• Espouses democracy, Gandhian secularism, equity, social justice and federalism.
• Wants that high offices in government be confined to natural born citizens of the country.
Challenges to political parties
lack of internal democracy
• The concentration of power in one or few leaders at the top.
 • Parties do not keep membership registers, do not hold organisational meetings, and do not
conduct internal elections regularly.
• Ordinary members of the party do not get sufficient information on what happens inside the
party.
• They do not have the means or the connections needed to influence the decisions.
• As a result the leaders assume greater power to make decisions in the name of the party.
• Since one or few leaders exercise paramount power in the party, those who disagree with the
leadership find it.
Challenge of Dynastic Succession
• Those who happen to be the leaders are in a position of unfair advantage to favour people
close to them or even their family members.
• In many parties, the top positions are always controlled by members of one family.
• This is unfair to other members of that party. This is also bad for democracy, since people
who do not have adequate experience or popular support come to occupy positions of power.
Role of Money and Muscle Power
• To win the election, political parties tend to nominate those candidates who have or can raise
lots of money.
• Rich people and companies who give funds to the parties tend to have influence on the
policies and decisions of the party.
• In some cases, parties support criminals who can win elections.
Parties Do Not Seem to Offer a Meaningful Choice
• In recent years there has been a decline in the ideological differences among parties in most
parts of the world.
• The differences among all the major parties on the economic policies have reduced.
• Those who want really different policies have no option available to them.
• Sometimes people cannot even elect very different leaders either, because the same set of
leaders keep shifting from one party to another.
suggestions to reform political parties and its leaders
• Passing of Anti defection bill.
• The Supreme Court passed an order to reduce the influence of money and criminals. Now, it
is mandatory for every candidate who contests elections to file an AFFIDAVIT giving details
of his property and criminal cases pending against him.
• The Election Commission passed an order making it necessary for political parties to hold
their organisational elections and file their income tax returns
• A law should be made to regulate the internal affairs of political parties. It should be made
compulsory for political parties to maintain a register of its members, to follow its own
constitution, to have an independent authority, to act as a judge in case of party disputes, to
hold open elections to the highest posts.
• It should be made mandatory for political parties to give a minimum number of tickets, about
one-third, to women candidates.
• There should be state funding of elections. The government should give parties money to
support their election expenses.
• we must be very careful about legal solutions to political problems.
• Over-regulation of political parties can be counterproductive. This would force all parties to
find ways to cheat the law.
• There are two other ways in which political parties can be reformed.
• One, people can put pressure on political parties. This can be done through petitions,
publicity and agitations.
• Ordinary citizens, pressure groups and movements and the media can play an important role
in this.
• If political parties feel that they would lose public support by not taking up reforms, they
would become more serious about reforms.
• Two, political parties can improve if those who want this join political parties.
• The quality of democracy depends on the degree of public participation. It is difficult to
reform politics if ordinary citizens do not take part in it and simply criticise it from the
outside.