The Sweden-based V-Dem Institute, affiliated with the University of Gothenburg, in its Democracy Report 2026, has once again classified India as an ‘electoral autocracy’, placing it at the level of democracy in neighbouring Pakistan, Iran, Egypt and Türkiye, which are criticised internationally for controlled democracy in their countries. This makes India’s position quite embarrassing.
However, the institute elaborated that the deterioration in the quality of democracy began in India in 2009, but it became more noticeable after Narendra Modi became Prime Minister in 2014. India was first classified as an ‘electoral autocracy’ in 2017, and since then, its status as a democracy has not changed. V-Dem no longer considers India an ‘electoral democracy’ because the conditions for assessing the level of democracy have not improved. It has only deteriorated continuously.
India received a score of 0.38 out of 1.0 on the Electoral Democracy Index (EDI) of the institute, based on different parameters used for measuring the level of democracy in a country. Such a poor democracy report has ranked India 106th out of 179 countries globally.
The report carries importance globally because the institute has over 250 years of history and experience of collecting global data on democracy and analysing it since 1789. Currently, about 4200 experts are involved in collecting and analysing the data for preparing the world democracy report for the institute.
The report is quite worrying for democracy-loving people in India and all over the globe because the score indicates official restrictions on freedom of expression and weakening of democratic institutions.
If we study the level of democracy in India based on V-Dem’s annual report in the last 50 years, we find that India’s democracy score has dropped to the lowest level since 1975, when a national Emergency was declared by Prime Minister Indira Gandhi. During 21 months of emergency, all elections were suspended, press censorship was strictly imposed and thousands of opposition leaders were jailed. In fact, all fundamental rights were suspended. However, India’s democracy score improved after the Janata Party government came to power after the lifting of the Emergency.
But the conditions prevailing during the Emergency do not exist in India today. Unlike the Emergency period, there has been no formal suspension of democratic institutions or elections. India continues to hold regular multiparty elections, and democratic institutions remain formally in place. Yet, the V-Dem 2026 Report has placed India in the category of ‘electoral autocracy’. This indicates that the quality of democracy is not good in India, which is considered the biggest democracy in the world because of India’s population.
The V-Dem 2026 report is, therefore, a big question mark on the ruling party, particularly PM Modi, who wants India to become vishwaguru or the world leader. Can India emerge as a world leader with such a poor democracy score? Certainly NOT. India needs to improve its image as a democracy if it wants to earn a place at least among Electoral Democracies, if not among the Liberal Democracies.
The V-Dem report has divided the countries into four regime types based on the level of democracy. The first is the CLOSED AUTOCRACY, in which people cannot choose their national leaders through competitive multiparty elections, such as China and North Korea. The second category is the ELECTORAL AUTOCRACY, in which elections are held, and multiple parties may compete and contest elections, but important freedoms and conditions needed for genuinely free and fair elections are restricted to a considerable extent. The countries mentioned in this category are India, Iran, Egypt, Pakistan and Türkiye, etc. The third category is that of ELECTORAL DEMOCRACY, where elections are genuinely meaningful, competitive, multi-party and largely free and fair, like the UK and the USA. The fourth category has been described as LIBERAL DEMOCRACY countries where there is electoral democracy with strong protection of individual minority rights, rule of law, and effective checks on government power, such as Australia, Spain, Germany and Sweden, etc.
The classification of countries based on the V-Dem report indicates that India’s level of democracy is considerably lower than that of several smaller European countries. The various parameters on which the institute judged the level of democracy include freedom of expression, independence of media, harassment of journalists critical of the government, restrictions on civil society, opposition parties and their leaders and, more broadly, the deterioration of democratic institutions and pluralism.
If V-Dem says that freedom of expression has deteriorated substantially, there are several examples to support this claim. A good example is the 2023 NewsClick case. Investigating agencies conducted raids at more than 50 locations pertaining to NewsClick and arrested its Editor-in-Chief Prabir Purkayastha and HR head Amit Chakravarty under the UAPA. The Delhi High Court, however, quashed the FIR and ED money laundering case against the news portal in June 2026, terming the proceedings a ‘gross abuse of law’. However, a separate anti-terror case under UAPA continues in the court.
Another example is that of the BBC. In February 2023, Indian tax authorities searched BBC offices in India shortly after the BBC broadcast a documentary critical of Modi’s role during the 2002 Gujarat violence. The documentary was subsequently blocked in India. These incidents by themselves don’t prove that India is an autocracy but it illustrates the kind of pressure on the media critical of the government, thus trying to weaken the functioning of the media as a pillar of democracy.
Similarly, the number of print/broadcast media criticising the government policies and decisions has declined substantially in India, which is one of the reasons for V-Dem listing India among ‘electoral autocracies’. This is proved by the Reuters Institute’s 2025 India report. It says that media ownership is concentrated among a small number of wealthy business groups, which are largely supportive of the prime minister, while independent journalists critical of the government face harassment or legal challenges.
Reuters Institute also reported that around 30 foreign correspondents signed an open letter protesting the treatment of journalists in India. The Reuters Institute reported visa uncertainty, denial of permits, threats of deportation and pressure from officials over negative coverage of the government.
The Government of India also brought pressure on civil society and NGOs and restricted their operations by amending the FCRA. Over 22,498 FCRA registrations have been reportedly cancelled after Modi became Prime Minister.
While Arvind Kejriwal was arrested as Delhi Chief Minister, innumerable cases have been booked against opposition leaders, including Rahul Gandhi, Mamata Banerjee and others, thus warning opposition leaders not to open their mouth against the government. Opposition leaders are also not given sufficient time to raise public issues in Parliament and state assemblies.
Democratic institutions like the Election Commission of India are also allegedly not working independently. They are alleged to be under strong pressure from the government. Many opposition leaders have alleged that the ECI is an extension of the BJP, the party in power.
In December 2023, 93 opposition MPs were suspended from Parliament during a single session after protests over a parliamentary security breach.
As far as financing of political parties is concerned, there is no financial equality among political parties. When Modi government introduced the electoral bonds system in 2017, it allowed individuals and corporations to make anonymous political donations. According to media reports, BJP was the largest recipient, receiving about half of Rs. 165 billion. The bonds system was, however, struck down by the Supreme Court over lots of hue and cry.
These and many other developments contributed to V-Dem putting India on the list of ‘electoral autocracy’.
[The writer is Chief Editor, India Tomorrow news portal.]