Common Sense of Common People in Elections

There is a saying: Common sense is not common! But common sense is really common to Indian people which is again proved in recent National Election 2019. The world’s largest democracy has just concluded its mammoth and torturous election process, which witnessed an unprecedented victory of democracy with the re-election of the Bharatiya Janata Party under the leadership of Sri Narendra Modi with the highest ever turnout of voters in a general election in India. In 2014 election Narendra Modi was an aspirant and challenger to grab Delhi, but in 2019 he was an incumbent and defender of his kursi. And finally Modiji got an overwhelming mandate with more seats and votes of Indian people than earlier 2014 election across the length and breadth of India over all the differentiating factors like castes, creeds and regionalities.

Here comes the moot question: On what basis and on what calculations common people re-elected Modi government? Let us analyse the common sensical factors that influence common people in choosing their representatives in election. At the first let all be clear that common people don’t make a monolithic entity. Common people have so many sub-identities on the lines of age, sex-gender, caste, creed, language, region, profession, economic status, ideological pinning and so many other dimensions. Again, common people have also a common national identity. Thus a common man is a mixed bag of different identities entangled and wrapped in a unique manner.

Then the most relevant question arises: How far a person can have the opportunities to know and analyse the contextual factors of his/her social environment and changing situation of which s/he is a member? In this context the famous Nobel laureate economist and psychologist Herbert Simon propositioned his Bounded Rationality theory and Satisfysing theory to analyse the decision making process. A person can’t know all factors relevant to take a decision so that the decision taken can be most beneficial and cost-effective. Then the so-called rational decision is ‘bounded’ by constraints. So a person makes a decision which is ‘satisfysing' – the best possible option s/he can make for the moment given the contextuality. Now the pertinent question: What are the factors influencing a voter to choose a party/candidate/NOTA in an election?
Here comes the Need Hierarchy theory of the famous psychologist Abraham Maslow to perceive and analyse the mentality of a voter. Maslow’s Need Hierarchy theory presumed a hierarchical structure of human needs in a pyramidal form, wherein the basic physiological needs of food, shelters etc come first at the base of the pyramid of human needs. And then comes other needs of safety needs, social needs and  ego needs to be fulfilled hierarchically. At the last comes the self-actualization at the top of the pyramidal need structure where a human being dose not require any external drive to be fulfilled and a person becomes self-contained, self-motivated actualised person.

With the above comes different push and pull factors operating in the external environment. Push factors have been the factors which push a person from his/her earlier choices, and pull factors pull a person towards a new choice. So, the three paradigms of bounded rationality and satisfysing choices, different levels of need fulfilment, and different push-pull factors influence a common man to take decision in life with some other motivational factors. Let us analyse the reasons behind the re-election of Modi government by the common people of India.

In India there have been the three types of elections, namely, national general election at the union level, state legislative election, and local level panchayat/municipal elections. The pertinent question is: whether a common man considers three different standards for three levels of election in India? We noticed that at least in this general election voters have gone that way. In few states where simultaneous elections have been held voters have chosen two different parties in two levels of state and central levels. Not only that voters who had chosen the Congress party in few states few months ago in Assembly elections did not go for that party and instead chosen the BJP for the general election. This voting pattern certainly points to the mental make-up of the common people differentiating between state level and union level elections. Then national issues on national security, national pride, national identity, and above all nationalism must have influenced voters as pull factors for Narendra Modi in whom common people got an authoritative and decisive leadership for their personal as well as national safety and security need fulfilment. As the great sociologist Max Weber explained, common Indians found a ‘charismatic’ leader in Modiji who is like a ‘Saint King’ and Saviour, particularly after the cases of Uri, Balakot and Abhinandan's unconditional release by  ‘weak’ Pakistan. All these fulfilled a ‘collective ego satisfaction' of Indians with respect to rogue state of Pakistan.

Let us now come to the fulfilment of basic needs of food, shelters etc. After coming to power in 2014, Narendra Modi gifted to common people an all-inclusive financial project of Jan Dhan Yojana with insurance coverage. It could join ordinary people with the banking system. Then so many central projects like food security, housing, toilets, electricity, gas connection, water connection, rural roads etc have been operationalised by Modi government to address the basic needs of common people. Along with these Modiji ensured direct transfer of government benefits to people through JAM – Jan Dhan account, Aadhaar and Mobile trinity to address the problem of leakage and corruption. With these measures came few social projects to address the acute problems of farmers like direct cash benefits, and pension schemes for both farmers and unorganized labours. And, MUDRA scheme tried to mitigate the loan problems for small and medium scale business and industries. All these schemes by Modi government have touched almost seventy percent people of India positively in their daily lives.

Next comes the fulfilment of social needs of a person. In Modi regime common people witnessed a digital revolution with easy data charges with smartphones. Social media is now so open and pervasive that anyone can get information without any hindrance. Narendra Modi used this social media to connect to the common people directly both through the old medium of Radio broadcasting and new social media of NaMo app, Twitter etc. People have always been in touch with the persona of Modiji who has been pulling people towards him.

Then comes two most important issues, namely, demonetisation and the introduction of GST. No doubt both common people and businessmen faced enormous problems and difficulties due to two issues. But the intension of Modiji to fight the whole process of corruption in public and business life was crystal clear to a common person. Common people felt a moral victory seeing all people in the  queue in front of the banks irrespective of socio-economic status. And, they believed that GST would ensure fair and accountable business environment minimising corruption in long-run. All these seem to be ethically correct for common people who are being pulled to Narendra Modi who has been hailed as a ‘Just Person’ in public life being able to run a corruption-free government.

Here comes the push factors. When we like to choose something someone, we like to know the alternative. Now in this general election no one could present himself/herself as a credible and accountable alternative. In the case of Rafale accusation by Rahul Gandhi, people realised that Rafale deal has been a government-to-government deal and there was no middlemen. And, the Supreme Court also couldn’t find any procedural lapsation. The CAG also found the deal appropriate. So the narrative of ‘Chowkider Chor' did not find any resonance and relevance in the collective mind of Indian common people.

With this comes the other important push factor due to the opposition’s paradoxical alliances which have only been based on the fierce opposition and slanderous personal attack on Modi. The opposition has neither any alternative vision to offer nor the chemistry of opinion-building except caste-mathematics. Moreover, arrogance and corruption of the incumbent parties of the opposition group in different states, particularly in Bengal, have pushed common voters from them towards the BJP.

Then the pull factor of the BJP President Amit Shah's organisational mechanism comes into play. Shah's relentless well-oiled organisational mobility and party workers ground level  mobilisation have ensured the omnipresence of the party, which has pulled common voters towards BJP as the most viable and credible choice of the people. The result is the unbelievable victory of Sri Narendra Modi with much more choices of common people of India.

@ Sujit Roy