That's the assessment of an NGO, which may have some merit to it, and maybe not.

To quote the same article,

> Prof Mukherjee says most non-academics would be incredulous that a handful of research assistants and country experts get to decide that a country is an "electoral autocracy" while hundreds of millions of that country's citizens would disagree.

> "So really this is an instance of academic discourse and concepts operating at a considerable distance from lived experience. The operational concepts across the two domains are very different."

Lol. This coming from an NGO based in a country with a hereditary head of state. Pot, meet kettle

> India is an electoral autocracy.

You forgot to write that it is according to "Sweden-based V-Dem Institute."

This is not specific to India. India is a poor democracy and that does not solve the compliance issue (either from companies or civil servants).

But it's still a democracy, although an awkward one.

The problem is in defining Democracy.

It’s probably the most robust democracy on earth. Voter participation is extremely high and voter fraud is shockingly low.