By D N Singh
In the present situation, with the continuing depopulation of the opposition by means of suppressions like pinning by allegations, building cases on otherwise ignored in constructive politics, the space for level playing field gets increasingly skewed.
Thus paving the way for political imbalance in electoral fields and marginalizing the scope for real & fair elections.
The brightest example is the case of Aam Admi Party that has been battered since long by a probe agency and has by now reached a climax almost.
In the case of other political parties such as RJD, BRS and few other front liners, like even the Congress, the tangent of the probes has either forced leaders to quit the parties and join the BJP or just left in the web of legal complications.
The case of Himant Biswa Sarma was an eye opener who, incumbent CM of Assam, had left Congress to join the party now he is in, openly admitting before quitting Congress that he was making political shift to avoid torment of probes.
There are many instances when in last nine years so many such shifting had foraged the Congress.
It is plain and simple that an uneven playing field is a central, yet underappreciated, component of contemporary authoritarianism. In many regimes, democratic competition is undermined less by fraud or repression than by unequal access to resources, media, and state institutions.
When opposition are denied access to finance and mass media, their ability to compete in elections—and survive between elections—is often impaired.
Where the playing field is skewed, the weakening, collapse, and/or cooptation of resource-starved parties may effectively depopulate the opposition, even in the absence of large-scale repression.
A skewed playing field may thus allow autocrats to maintain power without resorting to the kind of fraud or repression that can undermine their international standing, allowing them, in effect, to have their cake and eat it too.
The pointer yet again flicks at the AAP as what would happen to the leaders in jail and then what would happen if the chief minister Arvind Kejriwal is sent to Tihar.
They all matter, Satyender Jain, Manish Sisodia, Sanjay Singh and now Kejriwal who is now at the threshold of an imminent incarceration.
That brings the virtual depopulation of the party in mention.
