Beware the Silent Voters

PSEPHOLOGISTS AND other analysts tend to explain away their failure to correctly predict an election result with the term “silent vote” or “silent wave”. The phrase is often uttered by experts on TV as well as by journalists and anchors. We have heard it many times in the recent history of Indian elections. It is a vague term which sounds a little mysterious and hides the failures of predictions and analyses.

Another meaning of the term ‘silent’, in the context of votes and waves, denotes voters who do not declare loudly their political choices in public spaces like tea and paan shops, chaupals, etc. In our field studies during elections, we meet many voters who ignore our questions or give vague answers. Or they simply leave us confused. Such people may also be considered silent voters. In the course of our field research for the Haryana Assembly elections on October 5, we met a large number of such voters. At many places, from Panchkula to Sonipat, I met many people who asserted that silent voters are a separate category. They said that these silent voters were going to decide the Haryana polls this time. As we know, an election in Haryana is not merely about caste and class but also about kula and gotra. The category of silent voters, apparently, works behind factors like caste, class, kula and gotra.

This silence of voters does not appear to be merely a tactic to hide their political choices. It is also a communicative strategy for people that emerged from the need to respond to direct political questions. Silence in democratic electoral politics, however, also has social roots. It is the result of craft as much as a function of power relations.

Dalits are usually silent voters. They are silent because they do not want to antagonise the dominant sections—Jats and others—by showing their political choice. It is a survival strategy for the weak. Being silent does not always mean that a community lacks the capacity to speak

Share this on

Dominant communities usually speak confidently about their political preferences. They loudly declare their choice, sometimes because of their own social behavioural patterns and sometimes strategically. The objective of such strategy is to create an opinion in favour of the leader or party they support. In Haryana, Jats are socially and politically dominant. So, Jats do not hesitate to proclaim their choice, often conclusively and in an explanatory mode. But silent voters either do not speak out, or when they do, they speak in indicative or figurative ways.

Silent voters usually come from non-dominant communities. They may be mostly voters who belong to castes and communities that are smaller in number, socially weak and politically marginal. In Haryana, mostly non-Jat voters seem silent and therefore vague about their political choice. Even among non-Jat voters, there are socially, economically and politically dominant communities, such as Brahmins, Baniyas and Other Backward Classes (OBCs), whose voters speak clearly but not loudly like the Jats.

Dalits are usually silent voters in elections. They are silent because they do not want to antagonise the dominant sections—Jats and other village-level dominant communities—by showing their political choice. It is a survival strategy for the weak. Therefore, being silent does not always mean that a community or a section of it lacks the capacity to speak. Silence may sometimes even work as a weapon of the weak in democracy. That is because they know that pushing the right button on the EVM matters more than expressing their voting choice before the election.

When Dalits become politically aware and assertive, they start expressing their political choices in public. But this happens with Dalit communities that are big and conduct their own politics. Such Dalit communities declare their choice before the day of voting. In Haryana, this is the case with the Hindu cobbler community, the largest among Dalits in the state. Their political identity and aspirations evolved earlier than those of other Dalits because of historical reasons. They are mostly mobilised under the BSP banner. Other Dalit communities, such as Valmiki, Dhanak, etc, are not yet so politically mobilised or expressive about their electoral choices.

Moreover, with such socially silence, there are transitory silent voters who may be unhappy with the party and government for various reasons. They do not want to reveal their choice in conversations but express their displeasure only in the voting booth.

In a society like Haryana’s, which is dominated by Jats, silent voters may impress with their numbers. In this case, the term may not be merely a rhetorical tool. It may actually influence the outcome of the Assembly polls.

About The Author

Badri Narayan

Badri Narayan is a director and professor at GB Pant Social Science Institute, Prayagraj. He is the author of, among other titles, Republic of Hindutva

•