A New Experiment in Democracy: Elections in India

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Notes

1 As this is a survey of how a purely Western custom is succeeding in an Eastern country, it must necessarily be biased — be written from the point of view of the West, and judged by Western standards. Indians do not put any premium upon organisation progress and thrift : therefore they do not view official corruption and lack of publid spiritedness with any great disapproval, as we would. Their completely undemocratic culture pattern puts India at a disadvantage when judged by our standards. But as India must industrialise herself along Western lines, and looks to a Western type of government to accomplish that, we are forced to judge the results from a Western standard of values. The following report therefore niakes no attempt at a sympathetic understanding or an evaluation of the election from an Indian point of view.- A. and P.M.