Challenges to Indian Democracy: Analyzing Through the Lens of Human Security

The ideological conflicts that prevailed in the ancient society led to the development of many forms of political institutions and democracy is one such, which can be traced back to antiquity. Since ancient times, democracy has meant rule by the people. However, in modern times, democracy is a mixture of this ancient idea with individual liberty and human rights alongside it. Generally, democracy means rule by the people to ensure that every citizen takes part in the decision-making process either directly or indirectly through elected representatives. India is the largest democracy in the world. In the last more than 7 decades, it has worked successfully well to some extent. But today’s modern India has to face many challenges that need to be tackled to ensure true democracy. These challenges may include social and economic inequalities, poverty and unemployment, human insecurity, Illiteracy and ignorance, casteism, multiculturalism, communalism, population explosion, regionalism, corruption, and terrorism, etc. India needs to develop new proposals to reform democracy. Laws play important role in political reformation and may help to prevent wrong practices and encourage good ones. But mere legal changes alone do not help as the changes in laws may sometimes prove counterproductive and may negatively impact society. Therefore, the best laws empower people to carry out democratic reforms. The Right to Information Act is the best example that serves as a watchdog against the abuse of democratic principles. The challenges to democracy may be tackled by way of movements of activists or by politically conscious citizens. Some of the measures that can be taken to sustain a true parliamentarian democracy in India include: achieving 100% literacy; educating the masses about democratic rights; ensuring better protection of fundamental rights, and ensuring freedom of the press, etc. Moreover, democracy means that political institutions with democratic processes and every Indian citizen are to be democratic, reflecting basic democratic values of equality, liberty, fraternity, secularism, and justice in the social environment and individual behavior. At present democracy is being murdered by its own supporters like citizens and representatives simultaneously. The purpose of this article is to attempt an analysis of the problems and obstacles that the Indian democracy now faces, which has, of course, led to human insecurity as a whole, and to offer the required changes in order to guarantee that democracy in India can survive in the long term.