What Is The Cost Of A NOTA Vote? Dhruv Rathee Explains

Brut India

When did India get the option to vote NOTA? Is there a re-election if NOTA gets a majority? Do other countries vote NOTA too? Dhruv Rathee explains it all in this final video of our voting series.

Transcript

00:00What is the value of a NOTA vote?

00:02Friends, the vote of NOTA removed the Prime Minister of Poland from the chair.

00:07The vote of NOTA brought down the communist government in Russia.

00:10Let's talk about NOTA, friends.

00:13In India, for the first time, the NOTA option was introduced in the 2013 state elections.

00:28More than 15 lakh people chose the NOTA option then.

00:31India was the 14th country to introduce the NOTA option.

00:35In Greece, Spain, Colombia, it is called a white vote.

00:38In Argentina, it is called a blank vote.

00:41In Ukraine, it is called against all.

00:44In India, it is called NOTA.

00:46Friends, it is used in many countries in different names and different ways.

00:51For example, in Argentina, if you put a blank ballot on a ballot, it is called a blank vote.

00:58In the Norwegian election regulations, it is mandatory to give a blank ballot to every voter.

01:04On the other hand, there are some countries that do not have the option of NOTA.

01:07For example, Serbia, but the people there have become a little creative.

01:11There, people decided to make a political party called the None of the Above Party.

01:17So, this None of the Above Party fought in the elections.

01:20And in the 2012 Serbian parliamentary elections, this None of the Above Party won even one seat.

01:26It got 22,000 votes.

01:28There is a city in Indonesia, Makassar.

01:31Friends, in 2018, there were elections for the mayor in this city,

01:34in which only one candidate was standing.

01:37The second option was to press the NOTA button near the voters.

01:40And friends, the NOTA got more votes and defeated that candidate by 53% to 47%.

01:46So, again, there will be re-elections.

01:49Friends, there are many such stories in the world,

01:51among which the most interesting stories are of Poland and Russia.

01:54In 1989, there was a communist government in Poland.

01:58That government tried to manipulate the elections in such a way

02:03that in many places, there was no opposing candidate on the seats.

02:07But the people there hated this communist government.

02:11So, instead of voting for that candidate,

02:14they cut his name and put it in the ballot box.

02:16And because of that, they had to re-elect.

02:19And again, they had to re-elect.

02:21Even the sitting prime minister lost there.

02:23This was the reason, friends, why the communist regime fell in Poland.

02:28In 1991, the same story happened in the Soviet Union.

02:31More than 200 seats had to be re-elected with new candidates

02:36because the existing candidates were defeated by the NOTA.

02:39Out of the losing candidates, more than 100 candidates were communists.

02:43In 1992, when the Soviet Union fell and a new Russia was formed,

02:47the first president of that new Russia, Boris Yeltsin famously said,

02:51NOTA helped convince the people that they had real power,

02:54even in a rigged election.

02:56And it played a role in building true democracy.

02:58But unfortunately or ironically,

03:01in 2006, Russia removed the NOTA option.

03:04In any country, the significance of the NOTA is the same.

03:07We don't want to elect any of the existing candidates for the elections.

03:13If the NOTA gets a majority,

03:15then ideally, all the existing candidates should be dismissed

03:19and re-elected.

03:21But in our country, this doesn't happen.

03:23In our country, the NOTA doesn't have much significance.

03:27If the NOTA gets a majority in our country,

03:29it doesn't guarantee that the existing candidates will be dismissed

03:33or re-elected.

03:34So, the NOTA was just a way to give negative feedback.

03:37It was a way to convey the message to the politicians

03:40that we don't like any of you.

03:42There's no point in talking about the issues you're talking about.

03:46You should talk about our issues and listen to us.

03:48Only then, we'll vote for you.

03:49So, for the politicians, the NOTA was a way to create a vote bank.

03:53The people of NOTA want the politicians to come to them

03:57and convince the people of NOTA to vote for them.

04:01So, this was one reason to vote for the NOTA.

04:03But recently, in Maharashtra and Haryana,

04:06you've found another reason to vote for the NOTA.

04:09On November 6, 2018, the state election commission of Maharashtra

04:13passed an order that if the NOTA gets a majority,

04:17then re-elections will be conducted.

04:18On 22nd November, the state election commission of Haryana

04:22passed the same order.

04:23The reason could be that a few months ago,

04:26in the Panchayat elections in Maharashtra,

04:28there were a lot of seats where the NOTA got a majority.

04:31Specifically, there was a village in Pune where the NOTA got 85% votes.

04:36Friends, I feel that if this order is passed nationwide,

04:40if this law is implemented in this way,

04:42then the NOTA will become very useful.

04:44And actually, people will be convinced to vote for the NOTA.

04:47But the former chief election commissioner O.P. Rawat says

04:51that we don't have a legal framework to pass the NOTA.

04:54The election commissioners don't have this power.

04:57He says that the state assemblies will have to take this decision

05:00and implement it in their state.

05:02If the NOTA gets a majority, then re-elections will be conducted.

05:05H.S. Brahma, who is another former chief election commissioner of ours,

05:09has suggested that if the NOTA gets 10-15% votes,

05:13then re-elections should be conducted.

05:15And I feel that friends, to make it even more effective,

05:19not only re-elections should be conducted,

05:21but this law should also be passed

05:23that the existing candidates should be dismissed

05:26and only new candidates will be able to contest the re-elections.

05:29The trend of NOTA voting in our country shows a lot of interesting things.

05:34In the 2014 general elections, NOTA votes were at 1.1%.

05:38An economical and political weekly study has shown that

05:41between 2013 and 2016,

05:44the highest percentage of NOTA voting was seen in tribal areas.

05:50Specifically, in those seats which are reserved for scheduled tribes.

05:54This shows that the people of the general category

05:57were hesitating to vote for the candidates of the scheduled tribes.

06:01They didn't want to vote for them, that's why NOTA was voted for here.

06:04So, this shows discrimination among the people

06:07which is reflected in NOTA voting.

06:09In the 2017 Gujarat elections,

06:12there were more than 20 constituencies

06:14in which the winning margin was less than NOTA votes

06:18between the winners and the second place.

06:20For example, in the Godhra constituency,

06:22NOTA got 3050 votes.

06:24But BJP's candidate won from there with only 258 votes.

06:29This shows that NOTA votes have a huge impact on the election results.

06:34So, in the end, I would like to say that

06:36if you think that any candidate from your constituency

06:40doesn't deserve your vote,

06:42then vote for NOTA.

06:43Because with your one NOTA vote,

06:45the winning margin can be changed

06:47a politician can be convinced to bring another policy,

06:51a politician can be convinced to take another decision,

06:54NOTA voters can be convinced by listening to you.

06:57NOTA vote is very important for democracy.

07:00So, that's all for today, friends.

07:02I hope you liked this video

07:04which I made in collaboration with Brute India

07:06for this mini-series.

07:08Thank you!

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