Tamil Nadu has had a horrible winter. Drought, causing almost 50 farmer suicides and a looming drinking water shortage, would have been bad enough. But with the prolonged hospitalisation and death of former Chief Minister J. Jayalalithaa, Cyclone Vardha, the jallikattu protests and the violence at the end and then the political crisis of the last three weeks, one crisis after another has disrupted life and created uncertainty for people in the state. By the time the sun set over the Marina on Saturday, February 18, 2017, disgusted voters and exhausted journalists both just wanted the endless breaking news cycle to end.

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The political crisis in Tamil Nadu has unfolded in the middle of election season for five Indian states and the wealthy Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation. For voters in Tamil Nadu, it has brought home the consequences of the way we have allowed our political parties to function. We have let them nominate candidates who rarely have any standing or any track record of their own, and we have been willing to vote for party symbols, oscillating between the one and the other.

It is quite commonplace for voters to show up at the polling booth and then learn who local candidates are. We complain to each other in the queue, vote and then forget—even the name of the winning candidate. There is by and large no pretence on anyone’s part that the candidate matters. We have had some exceptional independent candidates—who lose, of course—and every now and then a party will nominate someone with an actual track record of public service. They win if the party is on a winning streak and rarely otherwise.

The actual candidate/MLA is usually so insignificant that when the crisis unfolded three weeks ago and MLAs were shepherded into buses and taken to the Golden Bay Resort, it did not even occur to me to wonder where our MLA was or on whose side. When one friend asked another this question, I thought, yes, where is he? More important, I am ashamed to add, who is he? I knew that in my constituency last May there was just one female candidate, a gynaecologist nominated by the DMK. I knew the AIADMK won. Who that winning candidate was, I could not have told you then or later without reading the Election Commission poster outside the booth. The candidate and I are both to blame. He had not bothered to canvas around our neighbourhood nor did he show up ever-after. But had I showed any interest in who this was and what he was doing? No. And I am a political scientist who writes crusading articles about citizenship.

My professional interest was piqued along with my anxieties as a citizen. What is our relationship with these individuals who ostensibly represent us? Impulsively, I posted a four-question poll on Twitter on February 16, 2017. Look at the responses to this completely unscientific survey.

When I realised I did not know the name of our MLA, I looked it up online. The same site provided his home address, email address and mobile number. I could have picked up my phone and called him. But I did not. Would others do the same? That was my first question. “Given the prevalent situation, would you be willing to call your MLA/ MP and share your views?” Eighty people responded. 60% of them said they would; 23% said they would not; 15% were unsure, and 2% chose other but did not respond to the invitation to share what they would do.

I could not explain my own hesitation about calling. I realise now it has to do with my perception of our MLAs—that in some way, there is something shady about them. Would you want your mobile number to be in the hands of someone whose work and dealings you do not really comprehend? I know that is very unfair and prejudiced but I think that at the heart of our reluctance to engage is our perception of local politicians as thugs (and national politicians as sophisticated thugs?). I felt this in spite of the fact that in Chennai, it is possible to reach me on the phone because of the work my NGO does. Why would a completely private citizen not feel the same reluctance?

My second question followed from my struggle to understand why I hadn’t dialled that number. “You would not call your MLA/ MP/ local representative. But why? If other, please tweet in response.” Forty-one respondents for this one, and 39% said they would not call because they did not expect their MLAs to answer the phone or listen to what they had to say. 20% picked the option ‘they can’t listen’ by which I had meant that even if they did, they would not be allowed to factor in our views. It was poorly worded, but Twitter has a severe restriction on length for each option. 12% did not know how to reach their MLAs and 29% picked all of they above—they won’t answer, they won’t listen and even if they did, it would not matter, and anyway, they did not know how to reach their MLAs.

In the age of the smartphone, the Internet and social media, we should not be wondering how we can reach our representatives. Indeed, MLAs like the former IPS officer R. Natraj use social media to great effect both to showcase their constituency work as well as to communicate with the public. It is possible for constituents to find contact information through the legislature’s website, the Election Commission’s affidavits, etc. but it is also a good practice for MPs, MLAs and corporators to reach out to their public pro-actively. Both sides are remiss but those who seek to represent us carry more responsibility to facilitate the engagement. To nurse one’s constituency means more than throw money at random profitable projects; it means to build long-term relationships with people, groups and institutions.

My third question was related to gender. As I hesitated to call or email, I wondered whether I would have found it easier to call a female MLA. I thought about the woman doctor who had lost the election. It would definitely have been easier for me to call her—both for reasons of class and gender, to be honest. But it would have still been easier to call any woman than a strange man about whom all I know is that he is an MLA. Did others feel the same way?

My badly-worded question was, “Would gender make a difference to your outreach/ their response, do you think? Comfort? Who'd be more responsive?” Of the 12 people who voted, half said gender would not matter. For 33%, it would make a difference and 17% were not sure. I would like to know if we expect that women representatives would be more responsive and accessible. Would that hold true for voters of all genders? Of course, my question did not open up to these possibilities; that is a poll for another day, and hopefully one conducted more professionally.

The last question I threw out to Twitter was, “Have you tried to contact your MP/MLA/local rep yet?” 54% of the twenty-eight respondents had not. Fourteen percent, interestingly, had; I would have liked to know more about them. Were they journalists? What accounted for their access or their comfort in reaching out? Fourteen percent could not find a number to call and 18% wondered what they would say to the MLA.

For the record, I still have not called my MLA but a few days ago, there was a newspaper report about him being accosted by constituents during his morning walk in a neighbourhood park. They were indignant about his pro-Sasikala vote. He was insistent that he had done right. He appears to view himself as an autonomous actor, empowered by his election as a legislator.

Beyond the who-said-or-did-what-to-whom that is the stuff of newspaper reportage and editorial pontification about the ongoing saga of Tamil Nadu politics, it is time to return to first-order questions about Indian democracy. What is the role of a representative? What, do we think, is the role of citizens in ensuring that representatives remain accountable to them?  What is our expectation of candidates who are nominated and what is the threshold at which we will stop tolerating candidates who do not mean certain minimum standards? What are those standards and how are we going to arrive at them?

Indians have a superiority complex about our democracy but exactly what does this democracy of ours entail? Are we superior because we sort-of-kind-of show up to vote? The quality of Indian citizen engagement is dubious. We pay no attention to the substance of even elections—the quality of candidates, the nature of campaign discourse or the manifestos. We constantly crave deliverance from something but never question the politics or the intentions of our self-appointed saviours. We ask no serious questions in the time between elections or if we do, we rarely read the answers. We exhibit no empathy that would cause us to challenge policy choices on behalf of anyone. We are so lazy that we want to give the benefit of the doubt to the state when it maligns those who are less apathetic and more vigilant than ourselves. We are the world’s largest democracy, but pushed against a wall, as Tamil Nadu was earlier this month, most of us cannot even name our representatives. There is a popular Tamil saying that seems to describe citizenship, Indian-style: It doesn’t make a difference to us whether Rama rules us or Ravana.

This must change. But change depends on the same people who are the problem—all of us. It is overwhelming to think about what we can do or where we can begin. Our lives are packed and we already juggle more responsibilities than we can manage. It is hard, even for those of us already in the social sector, to imagine ways to organise ourselves as voters. It is always hard to get political parties, especially in states like Tamil Nadu where party decision-making is top-down, to engage with us on anything—from gender violence to civic issues. Collective action seems too difficult to attempt—I confess I too feel that way right now.

But citizenship is also an individual responsibility. It is possible to try and learn more about election candidates before an election—search for the affidavits online, for instance. It is easy enough to share that information in conversations with family, friends, neighbours and colleagues. It is possible that our lunch-time conversations about politics are not gossip but centre around local, state and national issues. We could initiate and sign real-world and online petitions on issues that matter. The most important function the petitions perform is actually in articulating particular positions and getting people to discuss them. We could volunteer and support civil society, especially those working for our human rights. Show up and speak up—active citizenship is a lifestyle choice any one of us can make today. Let us start with ourselves and then regain the creativity, courage and capacity we once had for collective action.

Swarna Rajagopalan is a political scientist by training.