Vote Wisely or Repent Forever

There has been a significant change in the voting behaviour of Muslims over the years. The community is becoming politically mature by the day but still is in short to put pressure politically and by substance on the establishment to get fulfilled what they need the most in order to be at par with other communities in every sphere. In the coming LokSabha polls political parties will have some elusive political strategy as compared to past elections. And, therefore, it is essential for the Muslim community to vote wisely otherwise they will have to regret forever for not having voted tactically and sensibly.

There are a plenty of estimates available on the number of constituencies where Muslims can influence the poll outcome and also where Muslim votes are decisive and can decide the fate of candidates. In at least 74 parliamentary constituencies the percentage of Muslims is in between 20 to 95 percent. Muslim voters are in between 10 to 20 percent in 145 LokSabha seats.  All together in 219 seats Muslims can exert their influence in one way or the other.

In Eastern and Western Uttar Pradesh there are 36 LokSabha constituencies where Muslims are dominant and capable of turning the political outcome the way they want. Muslims are approximately 18.5 per cent in Uttar Pradesh and nearly 16 percent in Bihar. In West Bengal, the percentage of Muslims is roughly at 14 percent. In Assam, Muslims are around 30 percent while in Kerala they are 25 percent. In these states which account for 196 seats Muslims can play their part significantly to ensure that the secular and democratic notion of our country is protected and preserved?

But, despite these glossy figures available which look impressive and sufficient ground to boast upon, the fact remains that since Independence Muslim candidates who won parliamentary seats have remained in between30to 35 seats, except in 7^thLokSabha polls in 1980 the number of Muslim representatives rose to 49 which was 10 percent in terms of Muslim representation. In 1952, after first LokSabha polls Muslim representatives were 11 and their representation was only 2 percent. In the last LokSabha polls in 2009 the number of Muslim candidates was 30 and the representation was 6 percent. As per the 2011 Census, Muslims are nearly 15 percent of India’s 1.2 billion people. It is high time to ponder as to why the community has remained politically insignificant despite their numbers and strength. As long as these numbers and strength remained scattered and localised, the community will be far off from the decision making process, which has eventually hindered the pace and development in all walks of life.

The political accumulative strength of Muslims till today has been divided by various political parties in Muslim stronghold to cherish their respective agenda. Generally, Muslim votes get split either by many Muslim candidates in fray in one constituency or by dummy candidates who are only to spoil the votes in favour of or against other candidates. The need of the hour is to vote en-block to one single candidate despite so many Muslim candidates in fray or any other candidate who can consolidate secular forces.

The idea of a secular party which can encompass all existing Muslim political parties and like-minded secular people from different faiths as a united national political party is the need of the hour and has to be explored sooner or later, keeping in mind the emerging political strength of the community. There are a number of Muslim political parties but only two parties have so far made some noticeable performance in the past decade. The Welfare Party is also emerging slowly but steadily. These parties too will have to play a different role other than only asking votes for their ownrespective candidates. These parties have to be cautious as not to do anything that can spoil crucial votes.

Another very crucial area which requires attention of one and all and particularly of the community leadership is turnout of Muslim voters. Of the total percentage that is being counted upon only half of them really go to exercise their votes during elections. Most of educated or elite class Muslims do not cast their votes. In 1999, the turnout of Muslims was 67 percent as compared to all India percentage of 60 percent. But in 2004, it came down to 46 percent as against national percentage of 58. In the last LokSabha polls, the turnout of Muslims was 55 percent as against 58 percent nationally.