chapter 1

ERA OF ONE-PARTY DOMINANCE

Reason for victory of the Congress in first three General Elections:

 Legacy of National Movement: The Congress party was constantly involved in National
Movement for the attainment. People were closely associated with it and knew the party well.

 Charismatic leaders: The Congress comprised of several leader who were a good operator
and had a good personality. People were influenced from them.

 Wide spread: It was the only party then to have an organization spread all over the
country

 Role of Nehru: Congress had a very popular leader Pandit. Jawahar Lal Nehru and in the
opposition no one can match the charismatic role of Nehru.

Result of the FIRST GENERAL ELECTION:

 In the First General election out of 489 seat the party won 364 seats.

 Another party which got majority of the vote was Communist party with just 16 seats

 Congress won a majority of seats in all the states except for the parts of Kerala, Madras,
and Orissa.

 In the First general election the Congress rule all over the country at States and National
level.

Result of the SECOND GENERAL ELECTION:

 In the Second General election Congress was able to maintain its same position. They
won 75% of seats

 No other party could win even 1/10th of the seats.

 In 1975 also the congress did not win in Kerala.

Q Was the victory of Congress was artificial? Comment

 Even though Congress was able to win 74% of the seats but the total votes won was
just 45%

 The 2nd largest party i.e. Communist party won 10% of the votes but not even 3% of the
seats

 This states victory of congress in general term as artificial victory because of even 50%
of the total population. Secondly due to the First past the post system (FPTP) the one with
 maximum seat is declared as winner. This does not give the real picture.

DIFFICULITIES IN CONDUCTING ELECTION

Delimitation of the internal boundaries:

 To conduct election, it was essential to delimit the boundary of the state and district
which was a difficult task in a country where state had been formed after integration of princely
states

 Preparing Electoral Roll: there was a requirement to prepare the list of all the people who
were eligible to vote when the first electoral came out. The names of 40 lakh women were listed
as wife of or daughter of, and this had to be prepared again which took a lot of time

 Low level of literacy: At the time of independence only 15% of the voters were literate.
Therefore the election commission had to think of some special method of voting which
everybody could understand

 Large number of participants: When Indian got independence there were 17 Crore
eligible voters and they have to appoint 32 hundred MLA and 489 member of lok Sabha.

 Training of the official: To prepare or conduct election around 3 lakh officers and the
polling staff had to be trained.

why was the 1st election refer to as election of 1952?

The election were postponed twice and the final voting took place from October 1951 to February
1952.Maximum of the voting took place in Janurary

 Nature of the Congress dominance:

 Reason behind the success of Congress

 Legacy of National Movement

 Well organized

 Wide network

 Charsmatic leader

 Congress as social and ideological coalition

 In 1855 Congress emerged as a pressure group of educated professional and commercial

class. This led to the emergence of Congress party as an English speaking class

 After the civil disobeidence movement it became a coalition of various people who were
peasants, Industrialist villager, worker, lower and upper cast and class
 By the time India got Independence Congress became a social coalition representing all
the section of society.

 People can relate themselves with Congress.

 They have different peoples with different ideas like social, capitalist, Marxist etc. All
join to them and became a ideological coalition.

 They have joined or remained the part of Congress because they cannot find any platform
out of congress.

 Management based on ‘tolerance’ and ‘factions’

 They have different people and who were tolerate towards each other and have
place for different people.

 They have small groups called faction with different ideology and over they are
not agree to some issue inspite of leaving the party they remain inside and try to
convince the party.

 Emergence of opposition

 Criticizing the policy of Congress party helped in keeping the power of congress
under check.

 They provided an alternative to the people

 Major leaders of opposition party like Shyama Prasad Mukherjee, Dr. B.R
Ambedkar. Etc.