Democracy: Class 9 Social Science · Chapter 6

Picture a housing society with ₹3 lakh in its savings account. Some residents want a rainwater-harvesting tank; others want a park for the children. Nobody is allowed simply to grab the money. Residents meet, argue their case and finally vote, and even those who lose accept the result, because they had a fair say. That, in miniature, is democracy.

In this chapter we scale the same idea up to a country of more than 140 crore people. Keep four big questions in mind as you read:

1. How did the idea of democracy grow over time, and what does it mean to us today?
2. What forms can democracy take, and how do India and other countries practise them?
3. Which features make a system truly democratic, inside and outside government offices?
4. What challenges does Indian democracy face, and what part can you play?

6.1 Tracing democratic traditions from early times

The Republic of India is a little more than 75 years old, but the habits that democracy depends on are far older here: talking a problem through, looking for agreement, sharing responsibility. The Constitution built on these habits, and on ideas from other parts of the world.

In Chapter 5 (State and Society up to 1000 CE) you met the assemblies of the Vedic period: the Sabhā, the Samiti and the Vidhata, where members of the community gathered to discuss common concerns. You also read about the gaṇas or saṁghas, early states in which an assembly of leading members took decisions instead of a single hereditary king. Even powerful kings were not supposed to rule by whim: they were expected to consult assemblies and take advice from ministers and officials.

This line comes from the last hymn of the Ṛigveda, a hymn about unity. Put simply, it hopes that people who gather together will share one counsel, one assembly, one mind and one purpose. Its ideal of deciding together and then acting together is close to what we now call consultation and consensus.

The Bauddha Saṁgha, the community of monks founded by Gautama Buddha, also ran its affairs in a democratic way. Questions were raised and debated at meetings of the monks. When they could not agree, they voted: the rules of the order describe votes counted with slips of wood called salākā. Decisions belonged to the whole community.

This long tradition was interrupted. Invasions unsettled political life in parts of the subcontinent, and by the 1800s Britain ruled most of it. Under colonial rule, laws for Indians were made by British officials, and ordinary Indians had almost no voice in them. The freedom struggle changed that. Millions learnt to organise, to hold meetings, sign petitions, elect committees and march together, and the demand grew that Indians should govern themselves.

The work of writing a constitution began even before independence. The Constituent Assembly, set up in 1946, first met on 9 December 1946, and Dr B. R. Ambedkar chaired its Drafting Committee. Members argued over every article for 2 years, 11 months and 18 days; the record of those arguments is called the Constituent Assembly Debates (CAD). The result was the longest written constitution of any country, shaped by Indian traditions and by democratic experience elsewhere, from Britain's parliamentary system to the bill of rights in the US Constitution.

A constitution that could never change would soon fall out of step with the country. So Article 368 lays down how Parliament may amend it, and it has been amended more than a hundred times. What may not change are its core values of justice, liberty, equality and fraternity: in the Kesavananda Bharati case (1973), the Supreme Court held that an amendment cannot destroy the Constitution's basic structure.

6.2 Principles of democracy

A democracy can change its laws, its leaders and its policies. What it cannot do is give up certain principles and still remain a democracy. Here are seven that the Indian Constitution protects.

6.2.1 Popular sovereignty

Who gives a government the right to make laws, collect taxes or run schools? In a democracy the answer is: the people. The State's authority is not inherited or seized; citizens lend it. This idea is called popular sovereignty. (Sovereignty means supreme, final authority; the word goes back to the Latin superanus, “supreme”.)

Citizens use this power mainly by voting. Every citizen aged 18 or above can vote by secret ballot, so nobody can find out, or punish, how a person voted. This right of all adults to vote, whatever their wealth, education, caste, religion or sex, is called universal adult franchise (Article 326). The voting age was 21 until the 61st Amendment lowered it to 18 in 1989. Whoever wins then governs on the people's behalf, but only until the next election. You will study elections in detail in the next chapter.

6.2.2 Rule of law

Suppose a powerful local leader's car knocks down a cyclist. Under the rule of law (विधि का शासन), what happens next does not depend on who owns the car. The police register the case, a court hears both sides, and the law decides. Nobody, however rich or important, is above the law.

The rule of law has two parts, both found in Article 14. Equality before the law means the law treats every person the same, whatever their status, identity or rank. Equal protection of the laws means that people in similar situations receive similar treatment, without arbitrary discrimination.

Article 21 adds a further safeguard: a person's life or personal liberty can be taken away only through a procedure established by law. In practice this means three things. No one can be jailed or fined unless a valid law allows it and the proper steps are followed. Every accused person must get a fair chance to answer. And quarrels end up before a judge, not settled by whoever has more money or muscle. When people know that the same rules bind the powerful and the weak, they trust the system.

6.2.3 Fundamental Rights

The Fundamental Rights in Part III of the Constitution protect the freedom, equality and dignity of every person. There are six of them.

A right is only as good as the remedy behind it. That is why Dr Ambedkar called Article 32 the heart and soul of the Constitution: anyone whose Fundamental Right is violated can go straight to the Supreme Court, or to a High Court under Article 226. The rights belong to every person and cannot be sold or signed away. They are not unlimited, though. The State may place reasonable restrictions on them by law: freedom of speech, for example, does not cover inciting violence.

6.2.4 Separation of powers

Imagine a cricket match in which one team's captain also acts as the umpire. You would not trust the result. Democracies avoid this by dividing the work of government among three organs. The legislature makes laws, the executive carries them out, and the judiciary interprets them and settles disputes. This separation of powers stops any one organ from gathering all the power.

Each organ also has ways to restrain the others; this is called checks and balances. The legislature questions ministers and must approve the government's budget. The courts can strike down a law that violates the Constitution, a power called judicial review, and can even test a constitutional amendment against the Constitution's basic structure. Government agencies such as the police may act only within the laws and rules Parliament has made, and a citizen can ask a court to check whether they have.

For this to work, judges must be free from pressure. Judges of the Supreme Court and High Courts can be removed only by a special procedure in Parliament, and their salaries cannot be cut to punish them, so they can rule against the government when the law requires it. Ordinary people also need a way in. Through Public Interest Litigation (PIL), a person can ask a court to act for the public good, including on behalf of people too poor or powerless to go to court themselves. In the 1980s the Supreme Court even treated some letters and postcards as petitions.

6.2.5 Accountability and transparency

Suppose your panchayat promised a new handpump and, two years later, there is still none. In a democracy you are entitled to ask why, and someone is obliged to answer. That duty is accountability. Voters settle accounts at elections; in between, the media, civil society groups and public debate keep asking questions. Openness about decisions and information, called transparency, makes those questions possible, and a government that answers them earns people's trust.

Several arrangements make this real in India. In the Lok Sabha, the first hour of a sitting is usually Question Hour, when members ask ministers questions and ministers must reply. The Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) audits government accounts and reports to Parliament. The Right to Information (RTI) Act, 2005 lets any citizen ask a public office for information. The office must usually reply within 30 days, or within 48 hours where a person's life or liberty is at stake. Later in this chapter you will see how this law was made (Section 6.4.4).

6.2.6 Multi-party system

Walk past a wall of election posters and you will see many symbols: Indian voters usually choose among several parties. In a multi-party system, each party offers its own programme, based on its beliefs about how the country should be run, and voters pick the one they trust most. Some parties work across the country, others mainly in one State or region, and together they reflect India's variety. All of them must register with the Election Commission and follow the Representation of the People Act, 1951.

To form a government, a party needs the support of more than half the members of the elected house. The Lok Sabha has 543 elected seats, so a majority means at least 272. When no single party crosses that line, several parties may join hands as a coalition. The largest group outside the government usually acts as the opposition, which questions and criticises the government's work.

6.2.7 Safeguarding the rights of vulnerable groups

A democracy is judged by how it treats its weakest members. Centuries of caste discrimination, poverty and exclusion meant that some groups started far behind others, and treating everyone exactly alike would freeze that gap. So the Constitution lets the State give extra help where it is needed, while protecting every community, whatever its caste, gender, religion or region, from unfair treatment.

Article 46, one of the Directive Principles, asks the State to take special care to advance the schooling and economic well-being of weaker sections of society, especially the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes. It also asks the State to shield them from social injustice and every form of exploitation. Reserved seats for these communities in the Lok Sabha and the State Assemblies follow from this commitment. So do scholarships for students and reservation for women in local bodies (Section 6.4.3).

6.2.8 Citizens, institutions and the media

An election commission cannot make people vote, and a court cannot help someone who never learns their rights. Institutions work only when citizens use them: when they stay informed, take part and play fair. With such citizens, the institutions in the table below keep each democratic process running.

Federalism keeps power from collecting in one place. It shares power between the Union and the States through the Union, State and Concurrent Lists, and any leftover (residual) subject goes to the Union.

6.3 Types of democracy

Every democracy rests on the same core values, such as equality, freedom, participation, the rule of law, and rights matched by duties. Yet there is no single blueprint. Each country has worked out its own answers to two questions: who takes part in making decisions, and how is power divided?

6.3.1 Direct and representative democracy

In a direct democracy, citizens themselves vote on laws and major decisions. This works well for small groups, such as a village meeting. It is hard for a large country: imagine more than 96 crore voters voting on every bill.

Among countries, Switzerland comes closest. It has an elected parliament, but citizens also vote on national questions, usually up to four times a year. If 100,000 citizens sign a proposal within 18 months, the whole country votes on changing the constitution (a popular initiative). If 50,000 sign within 100 days, a law passed by parliament must be put to a public vote (a referendum). In India, the Gram Sabha, where every adult voter of a village can speak and decide, is a small-scale example of direct democracy.

In a representative democracy (also called indirect democracy), citizens elect representatives who make decisions for them. Elections are held at regular intervals, and the government stays accountable to the people because it must face them again. India is a representative democracy.

6.3.2 Parliamentary and presidential democracy

Representative democracies come in two main forms. In a parliamentary democracy, voters choose the members of the legislature, and the executive grows out of it. The Prime Minister and the other ministers sit in the legislature and stay in office only as long as most of its members support them. So the executive is answerable to the legislature, and through it to the people. India, Canada and the United Kingdom follow this system.

In a presidential democracy, voters elect the head of government, the President, in a separate election. The President does not sit in the legislature and does not need its support to stay in office: the term is fixed, and there is no vote of no confidence. Instead, the President answers directly to the voters at the next election. The United States of America is the best-known example; its President is chosen through an Electoral College for four years.

6.3.3 Democracies around the world

Here is how five well-known democracies are organised. Notice two different jobs. The head of state is the formal head of the country, while the head of government actually runs it; they may be the same person or two people.

6.4 Democracy in practice: India's living democracy

Democracy in India is not just a set of rules on paper; it is practised on a giant scale. India's list of registered voters is longer than the entire population of every country except China and India itself. Look at a few numbers from the textbook and the Election Commission of India:

• Voters: over 96.8 crore people were registered to vote in 2024.
• Representation: by the textbook's estimate, one Member of Parliament represented about 25 lakh people on average (2019).
• Languages: elections are run in the 22 scheduled languages and several others. On the voting machine, each candidate's name sits beside a picture symbol, so even a voter who cannot read can choose without help.
• Polling stations: more than 10 lakh, from snowbound Himalayan villages to forest and island hamlets; a few booths serve just one voter.
• Parties: over 2,800 registered parties (the textbook's figure), from national parties to groups active in a single district.

A democracy is living when people keep using it. On polling day, a fisherwoman in Kerala, a shepherd in Ladakh and a software engineer in Bengaluru stand in different queues, speak different languages and may follow different faiths. Yet each casts one vote of equal value under the same rules. That shared exercise, repeated every few years, turns a huge electorate into a working democracy. The next chapter looks closely at how elections work.

6.4.1 Participation beyond the ballot

Voting once every few years is only one part of democracy. In participatory democracy, citizens also help to shape policies and run public affairs. They join community efforts such as cleaning a lake or running a library, speak at local council meetings, and send comments when a government invites public views on a draft law or plan.

Government in India works at three levels, the Union, the States and local bodies, as you saw in Classes 6 to 8. The 73rd and 74th Amendments (1992) gave constitutional status to panchayats in villages and municipalities in towns. The Constitution also protects the self-rule of tribal communities in two ways:

• Autonomous District Councils (ADCs): under the Sixth Schedule, ten ADCs work in Assam, Meghalaya, Mizoram and Tripura. They can make laws on matters such as land, forests and social customs, and run village courts that settle disputes by tribal custom.
• PESA Act, 1996: the Panchayats (Extension to the Scheduled Areas) Act extends panchayats to Fifth Schedule areas in ten States. It makes the Gram Sabha the main decision-making body, for example on protecting local customs and managing community resources.

So a village in Meghalaya, a tribal hamlet in Jharkhand and a ward in Mumbai are all governed under one Constitution, but each with arrangements suited to its people.

6.4.2 Democracy at the grassroots

How does democracy look in a village? The two cases below are imagined, but each is built from things real panchayats across India do.

What do the two cases have in common? In both, villagers did not wait five years for the next election to be heard. They met, argued, checked the accounts and pushed for what they needed, and the panchayat had to respond. That is democracy working between elections.

You do not need a government office to practise democracy. In a dairy cooperative22Cooperative: an enterprise owned and run jointly by its members, such as farmers or weavers, who share its work and its gains., each member farmer has one vote in electing the board that runs it. A trade union chooses its leaders and votes on whether to accept a wage offer, and many religious trusts, community associations and civil society groups work the same way. Every government and aided school must have a School Management Committee in which at least three-quarters of the members are parents or guardians. When you elect a class monitor or a sports captain, you practise the same habits.

6.4.3 Women and the right to vote

Today it seems obvious that women vote. Yet British women campaigned, marched and even went to prison for it; some won the vote in 1918, and equal voting rights came only in 1928. American women won it in 1920 through the 19th Amendment, about seventy years after the first women's rights convention at Seneca Falls (1848).

India took a different path. Before independence, women's organisations had petitioned for the vote, and some provinces gave a limited vote to women who met property conditions. But when the Constitution took effect in 1950, universal adult franchise gave every adult woman the vote at once, on exactly the same terms as men. Yet a right on paper is not the same as a seat at the table. Many women still face pressure at home and in society that keeps them away from politics, and far fewer women than men sit in Parliament and the State Assemblies.

Real equality needs women in the rooms where decisions are made. Article 243D of the Constitution reserves not less than one-third of the directly elected seats in every panchayat for women, and one-third of the posts of chairperson. Many States have gone further. According to the Ministry of Panchayati Raj (replies in Parliament, 2023 and 2024), 21 States and 2 Union Territories reserve 50 per cent of panchayat seats for women. Article 243T makes the same one-third provision for municipalities. The textbook notes that by 2023, 17 States and 1 Union Territory had raised women's reservation in urban local bodies to 50 per cent.

For Parliament and the State Assemblies, the Constitution (106th Amendment) Act, 2023 provides that one-third of the seats will be reserved for women. It takes effect after the first census held after the Act and the redrawing of constituencies (delimitation) that follows it.

6.4.4 Information, courts and civil society

How does a demand raised in villages and newspapers become a law passed by Parliament? The story of the Right to Information Act shows each step.

Since then, citizens have used RTI to trace missing ration supplies, delayed pensions and unfinished roads. Groups that file PILs, run campaigns or organise neighbourhoods do something similar: they give ordinary people a way to reach those in power, so that fewer voices are left out.

6.5 Challenges to democratic practices in India

A democracy can be damaged slowly, by small everyday acts as well as by big events. Picture a bus set on fire during a protest, a rumour forwarded to fifty people, a queue jumped with a bribe, or a neighbour who shrugs, ‘Politics is not my business.’ Each weakens the trust and respect that democracy runs on. The Constitution gives us rights; using them responsibly is the other half of the bargain.

Some challenges are bigger than any one person's behaviour:

• Illiteracy and lack of awareness, which make it harder for some citizens to know their rights or judge what they are told.
• Misinformation and fake news, spread fast through social media and messaging apps, which can mislead voters, cause panic and, at worst, set off violence.
• Poverty and inequality, including gender inequality, which keep many people from taking part on equal terms.
• Regionalism and social discrimination, which can set groups against one another.
• Gaps in implementation, when good laws and schemes do not reach people properly, which can reduce trust in institutions.

6.5.1 The Emergency, 1975–77

The sharpest test that Indian democracy has faced came with the National Emergency33The Constitution provides for three kinds of emergency: a National Emergency (Article 352), President's Rule in a State when its constitutional machinery fails (Article 356), and a Financial Emergency (Article 360). of 1975–77. By 1974, prices were climbing fast, jobs were scarce, and many people accused the government of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi of misgovernance. Student movements in Gujarat and Bihar drew in large numbers of people. Jayaprakash Narayan, a socialist leader whom people called Lok Nayak (the people's hero), became the leading voice of the protests.

In June 1975 the government declared a National Emergency on the ground of ‘internal disturbance’. For about 21 months, people could not go to court to enforce key Fundamental Rights, including personal liberty. Newspapers were censored, and thousands of opposition leaders and activists were detained. The working of democratic institutions was badly strained, and citizens' freedoms shrank sharply.

In January 1977 the government called fresh elections. In March, voters gave their verdict through the ballot: the ruling party lost power, and the Emergency was withdrawn. Within two years, freedoms that had been suspended were restored through the ordinary working of democracy, by voters, not by force. The lesson was that rights need legal safeguards as well as alert citizens. In 1978 the 44th Amendment made a future emergency harder to declare. ‘Armed rebellion’ replaced ‘internal disturbance’, and the protections in Articles 20 and 21, including the right to life and personal liberty, can no longer be suspended.

6.6 Democracy and you

You do not have to wait until you are 18 to act as a citizen. The first duty is simple: know what is going on. Read a newspaper, follow more than one news source, and treat what you see online with care. Sound information lets you make up your own mind on public questions instead of borrowing someone else's opinion.

Many schools and colleges run National Cadet Corps (NCC) and National Service Scheme (NSS) units, and many students join the Bharat Scouts and Guides. Planting trees, running blood-donation camps or helping after floods, members learn to work in teams, take responsibility and serve others: civic responsibility in action. In daily life, civic responsibility can be simple: standing up for a classmate who is being bullied, thinking before you post, and following traffic rules. It also means joining in the festivals of communities other than your own.

Democracy, then, is less a finished building than a house that every generation must keep repairing. In India it began with assemblies and debate, took its modern shape in the Constitution, and lives today in elections, institutions and the daily habits of citizens. Its future depends on informed, responsible people like you.