There are about 60 national elections in 2024 involving two billion people, including the biggest of them — the national elections underway in India — and the election to the U.S. presidency. Across the world, elections are a volatile mixture of emotions, aspirations, competing ideologies, and sometimes even violence. It might then surprise many that, despite the cacophony, there is science behind the election’s processes.

About 2,500 years ago, the earliest form of elections in ancient Athens was a system that ultimately depended on the candidate’s luck. Among all the suitable candidates, one was randomly chosen. Since the winning criterion was based on random choice, campaigning or influence couldn’t help the candidate.

Tenth-century Chola inscriptions at Uthiramerur in Tamil Nadu reveal the practice of choosing village representatives through a ‘Kudavolai’ system. The final choice was made by randomly picking one among the candidates the people had voted for.

What is the ‘first past the post’ system?

Today, social choice theorists and mathematicians who study elections call this the approval voting system followed by a random choice. As a means of electing candidates, this process fails to reflect the will of the people. If this is a flawed process, what would be the right way to elect candidates? Surprisingly, mathematics tells us that there is no simple answer to this question.

The first-past-the-post (FPTP) system followed in India, the U.S., the U.K., and several other countries has many drawbacks. Critics have pointed out the disproportionate difference between the popular vote share and the seat share in many Parliaments. For example, in the 2015 Delhi Assembly elections, the Aam Aadmi Party received 54% of the popular vote but won 96% of the seats, whereas the Bharatiya Janata Party won 32% and 4%, respectively.

Second, winners in the FPTP system often secure far less than 50% of the vote share. No government in India, irrespective of its strength in the Lok Sabha (i.e. number of seats), has ever surpassed 50% vote share. Since 1918, only once, in 1931 in the U.K., did a government command more than 50%. So by the vote-share metric, rather than parliamentary seats, India and the U.K. were always ruled by “minority” governments. Expectedly, social choice theorists disfavour the FPTP system, though it continues to find wide use for its simplicity.

What are the Condorcet and Borda systems?

Are there better alternatives? Mathematical analysis to design better electoral systems dates back to the 13th century in the works of Ramon Llull, a missionary and theologian. His book ‘De Arte Eleccionis’, in the Catalan language, gives a detailed algorithm for a two-stage election process for church officials. It ensures that the winner, when pitted against each of the other contenders, receives more than 50% votes and is the most preferred candidate. This work was lost for centuries until it was discovered in the late 1980s.

Today, Llull’s method is called the Condorcet system after the 18th-century French mathematician Nicolas de Condorcet, who rediscovered it in the 1780s. While better than FPTP, the Condorcet system can be difficult to understand and isn’t used in any national election, not least because its mechanism allows participants to prevent the election of a particular candidate. Some smaller organisations use it to elect their leaders and board members, however.

The Borda electoral process, proposed by French mathematician Jean-Charles de Borda in 1784 — but first described by the 15th-century German astronomer Nicolas of Cusa — is a rank-based voting system (RVS) similar to the points table in sporting tournaments like the Indian Premier League. It allows voters to rank each candidate on the ballot paper, and through a process of vote redistribution, the winner is guaranteed to have at least 50% of the vote. Redistribution of votes can take several forms; the most common is to add the second and even third preference votes until one of the candidates crosses 50% vote share.

Are there problems with RVS?

The President of India is elected with the RVS system. In 1969, none of the 15 presidential candidates secured 50% of the first-preference votes. After adding second preference votes, V.V. Giri (who had 48% first preference votes) reached 50.8% and was declared the winner, defeating Neelam Sanjeeva Reddy. Like Condorcet, the original Borda method is complex and challenging to implement in large elections such as those in India.

In 1951, the American economist and Nobel laureate Kenneth Arrow proved that RVS can conflict with certain fairness criteria required of elections. This doesn’t imply such systems are unfair, even if occasionally the most popular candidate may fail to get elected.

Consider an RVS election with three candidates, A, B, and C, with nine voters ranking their preferences. The results can read thus: four voters prefer B over C, and prefer A over both B and C. This information can be represented as A > B > C (4). Similarly, other voters may yield different combinations: B > C > A (3) and C > A > B (2). The distribution indicates A received the maximum number of first preference votes and C the least. Suppose B withdraws from the election. In a fair election, we should expect the result to remain unaffected — but this isn’t the case with RVS. Here, with the same vote distribution, the result will now read  A > C (4 votes) and C > A (5 votes). So C has the most first preference votes now and wins. Arrow’s theorem asserts that such outcomes are unavoidable in an RVS election.

How can maths, physics help keep elections fair?

Ironically, while the cold rigour of mathematics sheds light on the inherently boisterous election processes, more grounded physics approaches draw on this lack of order to seek universal patterns irrespective of electoral systems. This is not unusual in physics.

For example, inside a balloon, billions of molecules, moving randomly and bumping against one another, conspire together to produce a constant pressure that keeps the balloon puffed up. This is the central lesson of statistical physics: order can emerge at the large scale even if dominated by disorder at smaller scales.

Two decades of election data analysis has revealed emergent patterns in the form of the distributions of quantities that matter to an electoral process. Despite the superficial chaos surrounding the elections, these patterns are robust and independent of finer details, such as where elections were held, the voting paradigm or the cultural context. Axiomatically, the absence of such order would suggest that elections are/were not fair and could be used to diagnose and flag electoral malpractices.

In short, while mathematical analysis helps sharpen an algorithm for the election process, a physics perspective serves to diagnose if the algorithm is fairly implemented in practice. The science of elections has a long way to go, but for millions of people across the world, the elections of 2024 provide hope that the future is in their hands.

M.S. Santhanam is a professor of physics, and Aanjaneya Kumar and Ritam Pal are doctoral students, all at the Indian Institute of Science Education and Research, Pune.

Kolkata:

The Trinamool Congress released its manifesto for the 2024 Lok Sabha election on Wednesday evening and vowed – as the Congress, the DMK, and other members of the INDIA opposition bloc have – to repeal changes to the citizenship law should it defeat Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s BJP.

Bengal’s ruling party – seen as part of INDIA despite failed seat-sharing talks with the Congress-led group – also made other big-ticket promises, including 10 free LPG (cooking gas) cylinders every year to below-poverty-line families and five kg of free rations (rice, wheat, and grains) monthly.

Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee’s party  also vowed to back farmers in the MSP, or minimum support price, row, which led to a months-long confrontation – including a blockade around Delhi – between protesting agriculturists and the centre in 2020, and a second round of protests this year.

The Trinamool has said it will set this price in line with the MS Swaminathan Commission’s recommendations and “at least 50 per cent higher than the average cost of production”.

The prices of petrol and diesel will be “capped at affordable levels” and a price stabilisation fund would be set up to handle future fluctuations in what is a volatile international market.

The Trinamool has also promised 100 days of guaranteed work to all job card holders, and that all registered workers, nationwide, will now get Rs 400 per day.

It has also reached out to students, promising to triple the number of higher education scholarships for marginalised – Other Backward Classes, and Scheduled Castes and Tribes – communities.

For senior citizens (over 60 years), the existing pension scheme will be overhauled. They will now get Rs 1,000 per month. “Dignified housing” has been guaranteed for all poor families in the country.

This will provide “safe and secure homes” to all, Ms Banerjee said.

“These are the promises which we will fulfil as part of (the) INDIA bloc, when it forms the next government,” outgoing Rajya Sabha MP Derek O’Brien said at the launch event in Kolkata.

The manifesto was released as Mamata Banerjee ripped into the BJP while campaigning for her party’s candidate in Assam’s Silchar. A fierce critic of the saffron party, Ms Banerjee offered a chilling warning to voters everywhere, saying, “This election is going to be scary…”

READ | “Think PM Will Give You Justice?” Mamata Banerjee in Assam

The Trinamool manifesto follows those of its allies – Tamil Nadu’s ruling DMK and the Congress, as well as that of the CPI(M), which made headlines by vowing to dismantle India’s nuclear weapons.

READ | No Citizenship Amendment Act, Uniform Civil Code: DMK Manifesto

The CPI(M)’s promise triggered pushback from Defence Minister Rajnath Singh, who said the Left party was playing with national security and claimed a “deep-rooted conspiracy” against the nation.

READ | CPI(M) Manifesto Promises To Dismantle India’s Nukes

The BJP released its manifesto last week.

READ | BJP Releases ‘Modi Ki Guarantee’ Manifesto, Congress Calls It Apology

The document underlined Mr Modi’s focus on the poor, young men and women, farmers, and women, all of whom are seen as key vote banks for the saffron party. He said the manifesto focused on the “dignity (and) quality of life” and the “quantity (and) quality of opportunities”.

The Congress released its manifesto on April 5 and, like the Trinamool, said it would roll back the changes to the Citizenship Amendment Act and ensure legal backing for farmers’ MSP demands.

READ | Congress’ 2024 Manifesto Focuses On Jobs, Vows Caste Census

Crucially, the party also said it would order a national caste survey, which is one of the biggest talking points in this election, and has been so since Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar – whose Janata Dal (United) was an INDIA leader till he jumped to the BJP – ordered its survey last year.

The Congress manifesto invited acerbic responses from the Prime Minister and senior BJP leaders, who described it as a “Muslim League imprint”. Congress boss Mallikarjun Kharge shot back and accused Mr Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah of “spreading falsehood”.

The 2024 Lok Sabha election will begin on Friday and run till June 1. Voting will take place over seven phases. The final result will be declared on June 4. In the 2019 election, Ms Banerjee’s Trinamool won 22 of the state’s 42 seats. The BJP got 18 and the Congress won the other two.

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New Delhi:

The Election Commission will announce the schedule of the upcoming Lok Sabha polls this afternoon. In a post on X, the poll body said the dates for the general and some state assembly elections will be announced at 3 pm today.

The tenure of the present Lok Sabha ends on June 16 and a new House will have to be constituted before that. The tenure of Andhra Pradesh, Sikkim, Arunachal Pradesh, and Odisha assemblies will also end in June.

Nearly 97 crore people are eligible to vote in the upcoming polls.

LIVE UPDATES: Lok Sabha Election 2024 Date | Assembly Election 2024 Schedule

In the last parliamentary polls, the BJP, seeking a third consecutive term this time, won 303 seats, while the Congress got 52 seats. It could not muster enough numbers to claim the position of Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha.

The upcoming polls are extremely crucial for the Opposition bloc INDIA, fighting to stop the BJP’s run.

Here are the LIVE updates on the big story:

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Lok Sabha Elections 2024: 5 Points About Rahul Gandhi, Congress Candidate From Kerala Wayanad

Congress leader Rahul Gandhi will contest the Lok Sabha elections 2024 from Kerala’s Wayanad. He was among the 39 candidates announced by Congress in its first list. Mr Gandhi is a four-time MP. He lost from Amethi in 2019.

1) Born on June 19, 1970 to former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi and Sonia Gandhi, Rahul Gandhi is the grandson of Indira Gandhi, also a former Prime Minister, and the great-grandson of the country’s first Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru. Rahul Gandhi was homeschooled after the assassination of Indira Gandhi.

2) Rahul Gandhi entered electoral politics during the 2004 Lok Sabha elections from UP’s Amethi seat, then a stronghold of the Nehru-Gandhi family. The high-profile Lok Sabha seat was previously represented by Rajiv Gandhi, Sonia Gandhi, and Sanjay Gandhi.

3) The Congress-led United Progressive Alliance (UPA) came to power in 2004. Rahul Gandhi wasn’t a part of the government. He focused on working in the party and was appointed Congress’s general secretary in 2007. 

4) Rahul Gandhi was appointed Congress vice president in 2013. The UPA government suffered defeat at the hands of the Narendra Modi-led BJP’s campaign in the 2014 elections. The Congress was reduced to its lowest-ever tally of 44 seats. 

5) In 2017, Rahul Gandhi was appointed Congress president, replacing his mother Sonia Gandhi. Rahul Gandhi lost his family stronghold seat of Amethi, but was elected from Wayanad. He resigned from the post of Congress president in view of the party’s dismal performance in the polls.

Lok Sabha Elections 2024: 5 Facts On Amit Shah, BJP’s Gandhinagar Candidate
Union Home Minister Amit Shah will contest the 2024 Lok Sabha elections from Gujarat’s Gandhinagar. 

1)Apart from his mother, the teachings of Kanhaiyalal Maneklal Munshi, an Independence movement activist, politician and writer, also had a deep influence on Amit Shah.

2) Amit Shah’s interest in politics could be gauged from his active participation in the election campaign of Maniben Patel, the daughter of Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, at the age of 13.A few years later, Mr Shah joined the RSS

3) Amit Shah, who became the secretary of BJP’s Ahmedabad unit in 1989, participated in the Ram Janmabhoomi movement and later in the Ekta Yatra. 

4) In 1997, Amit Shah, already the National Treasurer of the BJP’s Yuva Morcha, contested the Sarkhej assembly by-election and won by a margin of 25,000 votes. During his tenure as an MLA, Amit Shah developed close ties with then Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi, eventually forming one-half of the Modi-Shah juggernaut. 

5) In 2014, he took over as the BJP National President and was elected to the Rajya Sabha from Gujarat in 2017. In 2019, he entered the Lok Sabha after winning the Gandhinagar seat by a margin of over 5 lakh votes. He became the country’s Home Minister.

Lok Sabha Elections 2024 LIVE: 5 Facts On PM Narendra Modi, Who’s Looking To Win From Varanasi Again

Prime Minister Narendra Modi will contest once again from Varanasi in the Lok Sabha polls as he seeks a record third term.

1) Born on September 17, 1950, in Vadnagar town of North Gujarat’s Mehsana district, Narendra Modi lived with his entire family in a single-storey house.

2) As a child, Narendra Modi, was believed to have been inspired by the teachings of Swami Vivekananda.

3) At the age of 17, Narendra Modi left Vadnagar to travel across India, exploring cultures, and getting to know his country better. In 1972, Narendra Modi went to Ahmedabad and joined the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS).

4) In 1987, Narendra Modi entered mainstream politics and was made the General Secretary of BJP’s Gujarat unit in a year. In 2001, the party’s high command chose Narendra Modi to replace Keshubhai Patel as the Gujarat chief minister, a post he went on to hold until 2014.

5) In 2014, the BJP came to power at the Centre after a decade of Congress rule, and Narendra Modi, who by then had established himself as a name synonymous with development, was sworn in as India’s Prime Minister.

Election 2024 Date LIVE: Who Are The New Election Commissioners Named To Poll Panel?
Two new Election Commissioners were inducted, after the retirement of Anup Chandra Pandey in February and Arun Goel’s surprise resignation last week. Former IAS officers Gyanesh Kumar and Sukhbir Singh Sandhu have been named to the panel.