Getting almost anything done without having to wait months / years / decades requires some form of black money payment ie a bribe.
I don’t agree with any of this of course but it is unfortunate reality here.
"Complaints are everywhere ... that the public good is disregarded in the conflicts of rival parties, and that measures are too often decided, not according to the rules of justice and the rights of the minor party, but by the superior force of an interested and overbearing majority."
I believe the problem is laws related to religion and hate speech. They are stupid. Section 295 is non-bailable offence and can be easily abused by either side to placate group that feels offended.
The discussions about India sliding into authoritarian is interesting because strictly speaking many of these laws are pretty old. I wish that these laws did not exist but strictly speaking these laws have been abused to placate Hindus, Muslims, Christians(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weeping_crucifix_in_Mumbai) at different times.
A number of legitimate polls have found substantial majorities/pluralities opposing the ruling [0].
> should have either seen pressure building up on "pro-life" states
On the one hand, I've definitely seen this pressure at the grassroots. On the other hand, there has probably been significant geographic sorting, especially as the states that are leaning towards de jure abortion bans have been trending that way de facto for years, likely driving people that care about the issue to friendlier states.
> or a BLM style movement in favor of legalizing abortion.
Give it a minute, abortion was a legally protected right until 2 weeks ago.
[0] https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/americans-views-on-abor...
And before you complain, that's exactly what I was talking about. That's what we are talking about.
Alternative crowd sourced media houses such as AltNews, The Wire among others are under real danger as are socio-political activists, union organizers, smaller opposition political parties, etc.
These laws are vague to a fault and govt. has given themselves too much power (and I do not see it changing anytime soon, who wants to give up power?). It is easy to selectively apply these laws and that in itself can promote enmity that these laws were designed to protect from.
The only exception is if you manage to piss off someone higher up in the power hierarchy.
Its not so much as authoritarian as it is Darwinian.
It is not about govt per se (which is grappling with bigger issues - Russia, Srilanka..) but is about mid and lower level politicians, govt and police officers..
Also the pattern is inconsistent, some regions in India is polar opposite to this kind of right leanings - Ex. East of India. Some are neutral - most of South India. India is a large and complex country; the general sentiment is no different than looking at Ireland and thinking French politics generally sucks (or whatever appropriate example.. I have no clue how politics is in either of these countries).
I thought that it was obvious :)
The cases where it becomes authoritarian is when it comes to religion and criticism of the government. This is the reason that the majority of the population does not even believe in issues that exist (social, political, ecological or otherwise).
Do you have any examples, where someone was arrested for simply criticising govt actions?
1. https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/editor-arreste...
Muslim citizens of India being arrested for criticizing the government's action of insulting their religion
One even had their family home demolished without any due process as revenge for criticizing the government
Hindu Nationalist’s Historical Links to Nazism and Fascism
Sorry for the awful source, but the predecessors of the BJP were openly patterned after European fascist movements, there were contacts between them and a mutual affection. There's even a strain of European mystic Hindu Nazism: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Savitri_Devi
AltNews alleges that RazorPay banned their account (and later restored it) without cause: https://archive.is/R9OJ8
To me, it seems like RazorPay simply buckled under pressure. Why wouldn't they, they need to be in bed with the central govt, or their business falls apart pretty quick.
India is not pro-Western, and none of those things upthread are inconsistent with democracy. They are illiberal, perhaps, but not all democracy is liberal democracy.
This line of reasoning feels like a motte and bailey to me. When that fact is being trotted out by supporters it's almost always a comparison to liberal democracies. I doubt when Indians say "we're the largest democracy" they're comparing themselves to russia.
New York Times:
“India is valued the world over for a great many things, but for three over others: the Taj Mahal, Mahatma Gandhi and India’s electoral democracy.” It is the 17th general election in India, being held in seven phases over 38 days. Nine hundred million Indians are registered to vote! Around 70 percent are expected to vote. The voting age in India is 18, and 15 million are voting for the first time.
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/25/opinion/india-elections.h...
USA + European Union = ~750M population (not voters)
Minorities are routinely targeted, court judgments are filled with personal opinions... i could go on.
The mere existence of a voting system does not a full democracy make. Remember, Russia also has "elections".
> court judgments are filled with personal opinions..
Sounds like another country that we know of.
The West tends to cultivate them in relation to China, at which point calling them "the biggest democracy in the world" is simply a propaganda tool to sell them as the 'good guys' to public opinions (vs. China who are obviously the 'bad guys'). But the issues between India and China are independent of any "pro-Western" stance or political system, they are purely based on conflicts of interests between those two countries, including left-overs from the British Empire when it comes to border disputes.
This is what you are made to believe by the propaganda machine. As someone else mentioned here, India is "elected autocracy". And "first-past-the-post" election doesn't mean the government has support of the majority of Indians.
Sad to say as an Indian, India is going Russia way.
For Non Indians here, TimesNow is the channel and that news reporter is Laura Ingram of India.
Twitter has been having a very hard time operating in India too(2) and routinely censoring stuff so while IANAL just remember that things are very different in different parts of the world.
(1) https://www.hindustantimes.com/india-news/arrested-over-a-fa...?
(2) https://restofworld.org/2022/twitters-censorship-india/