Editorial
Political party registration
We endorse EC's flexible position
THE Election Commission has relaxed further the rules concerning the registration of the political parties. Since the registration is mandatory for their participation in the next general election, the political parties have to meet the eligibility criteria to emerge as recognised parties.
The EC has adopted a pragmatic and flexible approach to the issue. We fully endorse it. The parties are being registered for the first time and it would have been self-defeating to leave a large number of them out of the new scheme by taking a rigid stand on the matter. The rules set by the EC will require the parties to fulfill eight conditions for obtaining registration. The conditions appear to be logical as, for example, the parties having had at least one seat in any parliament will be considered eligible; and so will be the parties polling not less than two per cent of the votes even if they didn't get any parliamentary seat.
The registration of the political parties will initiate the process of making them transparent and accountable and, to some extent, subject to scrutiny. This will also help eliminate the parties which exist only in name. Obviously, relaxation of the rules will allow more parties, which may otherwise have been disqualified if the original standards envisaged by the EC were to be applied. But then we cannot perhaps attain our objectives overnight. Registration itself is a move forward, which will bring the parties out of their present position of being designed and run by their own rules and norms which leave a lot to be desired. The point has become all the more relevant, since democratisation of the structure and decision-making process of the parties is now a much sought after goal.
The political parties, for their part, should come out of their archaic mode and accept the truth that any organisation working for people, in whatever form, must go by certain rules. If we need trade licence to run a business why mustn't be political parties registered entities. The EC has gone through a process of dialogue with the civil society, media and the political parties before relaxing the registration rules. We believe the issue should not be diluted any more and the registration process should begin forthwith.
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