India’s Endangered Democracy

Abstract

According to the most recent UN data, 20.9 percent of Indian children younger than five are too short for their age (stunted), and 17.3 percent are too thin for their height (wasted). [...]despite a supine election commission, widespread fear-mongering about illegal immigration from Bangladesh, and a highly skilled state-run social-media campaign, Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) failed to dislodge the incumbent Trinamool Congress government in the 2021 West Bengal state elections. [...]the efforts of the BJP state machinery proved mostly futile. [...]the electoral system’s troubles are pervasive: Since India lacks public campaign financing and weakly implements electoral laws, the quantity of dark money in both national and state elections has surged, further eroding the integrity of the polls.