LOKNITI

KAS-CSDS Study on Youths in Indian Politics

Introduction

Youth symbolizes energy, and Politics is about rights, representation, justice, and change. Thus the synthesis of youth and politics is about hope, revolutionary ideas, transformations and a brighter future. The Indian electorate in the 2009 elections has sent seventy one parliamentarians under the age of forty years to the Lok Sabha, and fifty eight of them are first timers. The idea that a larger proportion of youth in the population will lead to a greater role for youth in politics is based on the assumption that they constitute a distinct political constituency — a section of population with distinct political preferences, attitudes and voting patterns. However, it may also be said that a lot of the media hype about the youth, as a category, is simply a marketing gimmick to catch the attention of metropolitan, well-to-do, young consumers. There is also no denying that most of these young MP’s are products of a privileged upbringing with family background in electoral politics, and there may be real danger to democratic functioning if this is an indication of India moving towards “dynasty democracy”. However, conversely, one must remember that a family name may give a candidate a head start but ultimately a candidate seeking election has to prove his/her mettle.

There is no dispute that there are a large number of voters who are young. And if we look at turnout among youth and whom the youth vote for, we find no distinct pattern. In the last four Lok Sabha elections, for which we have reliable data , the youth-vote for the major political formations has been within a two-percentage point band around the average vote share. It seems that the youth are not very different from the rest of the population. All these issues raise some significant questions on Indian youth’s interest in politics and their political participation that have larger political implications. Thus Lokniti, CSDS proposes to conduct a micro level study to map out the nature and character of ‘youth politics in India’.

Table 1: 2009 Parliamentary Elections – An Overview

Total Number of Parliamentary Constituencies	543
Number of seats reserved for Scheduled Caste	84

Evidences generated from the National Election Study series conducted by Lokniti, CSDS.

Number of seats reserved for Scheduled Tribe	47
Number of seats for General Category	412
Total Number of Electorates in Lok Sabha 2009	713,775,122
Voter turn out (%)	58
Total number of MP’s in the age group of 25-40 years	71

Source: ECI

Objectives of the Study

Proposed research sets forth the following objectives:

To assess levels of interest and participation of the Youth in Politics,

To map out what motivates and guides youth’s interest and participation in politics,

To ascertain opinions on the dangers, if any, of only people with political family background being elected, and finally

To identify issues, aspirations and opinions of youth on contemporary Indian electoral politics and Democracy

Mapping out Youth in Politics in 2009 Elections

Fig 1. Political/Party affiliation of the 71 Young MPs in 2009 Parliament

Fig 2. State wise distribution of the 71 Young MPs in present parliament

Source: ECI

A preliminary analysis of NES 2009 indicates that in parliamentary constituencies where MPs below the age of forty years have been elected, the voters below the age of 34 years show greater degree of interest in politics compared to those voters who are 35 years or more than that age. Thus it would be interesting to study if this greater degree of interest in politics is guided by the available option for choosing a young leader to the parliament, which they did, or if there is no correlation between that. If there is no correlation what generates greater interest amongst the Young voters in these constituencies?

Methodology

The study will be based on primary data collected from field survey. However, other methods such as focus group discussion and long interview will also be an integral part of the study. The field setting survey component will enable us to map out the differentiation in opinions of young electorates on politics. The survey would also help us in ascertaining if the political choice of the youth voters in these selected constituencies is in any way guided by the age of the candidate? How important is age as a category for making political choices amongst the common young voter? While the survey will help us in probing these issues only at the macro level, the FGD (focus group discussion) will help us to ascertain this point of views amongst the Young voters in greater details. The information gathered from the FGD will help in giving the flesh and blood to the structure of the argument, which will be created basically from the findings of the survey of cross section of young voters.
In addition to the survey and FGD, detailed interviews with the MPs elected from the constituencies where the study would be conducted will help us in getting the other side of the story; i.e. the views of the Young MPs in question. The young MPs who would form part of the study would be probed regarding the question whether they believe that their young age helped in mobilizing voters, especially young voters, in their favour; or if they think that their age hardly had an affect on voters’ choices?

Survey Method

Sample Selection
A sample forms a part of, and is drawn from, a larger whole called the ‘population’ or ‘universe’. Complete coverage of a population in a research study is neither feasible nor desirable. The usual procedure is to take a representative sample from the population and apply the results of the sample study to the population according to accepted statistical procedures.

Sample Frame

In-depth study in 15 selected Parliamentary constituencies (20 percent of the constituencies which elected Young Member of Parliament) for the study. Sampling of PC would be the most crucial criteria of this study and thus we plan to devise indicators (eg. consideration of geography, political party elected, political lineage of the elected MP, gender ratio of the MPs, category of the constituency etc) for this. These indicators would ensure that our sampled is not biased in terms of party affiliation of these MPs, their locality and gender.

About 180-200 respondents would be interviewed in each parliamentary constituency. To ensure a comparative analysis of different age groups. We will use quota sampling technique here to ensure that we have fair presentation from all age groups while focusing on our target group of young voters who are in the age group of 18-34 years

One focus group discussion with young voters in 5 of the constituencies where the survey would be conducted. These five constituencies would be sampled from the already sampled fifteen constituencies. We would invite approximately 20-25 young voters of these constituencies for this discussion. They would be encouraged to express their views about youth’s participation, interest in politics. The participants for the focus group would be selected from those young voters who would have some interest in politics, or may be occupying some political position or member of some political organization. The idea is to get opinion about Youth’s participation in politics from the youth who are themselves politically active.

The sample would be drawn using multistage stratified random sampling that has been the hallmark of the CSDS tradition. In Stage I, Parliamentary Constituencies will be selected. The Parliamentary Constituencies will be selected purposively. This purposive selection of PCs would be done in considerations with the indicators mentioned above. In Stage II, sampling of Assembly Constituencies (ACs) within sampled PCs will be done. The Assembly Constituencies within each selected Parliamentary Constituency would be selected using systematic random sampling method. Three assembly constituencies would be selected in each PC randomly. In stage III, sampling of Polling Station (PSs) will be done within each sampled AC. The selection of PSs will be done by listing all the PSs within the sampled AC in the serial order followed by the Election Commission and using the systematic random sampling procedure. Four polling stations would be selected from each sampled ACs. Stage IV is the Sampling of Respondents. It will be done by drawing the sample from the latest electoral rolls of the selected polling stations. Electoral rolls of the sampled PS will be obtained from the office of the Chief Electoral Officer of the state or the district election office. Twenty respondents would be selected from sampled polling stations and thus in totality we would be targeting two hundred and forty respondents in each sampled Parliamentary Constituencies.

Sample Frame

Total No. of PC’s sampled	15
Total No. of AC’s sampled	45
Total No. of PS’s sampled	180
Total No. of respondents targeted @ 22 respondents	3960
Total No. of respondents estimated to be achieved @ 14 respondents per PS	2520 (Approx.)

Note: The total number of completed interviews may vary due to different completion rate in different polling booths

The Survey Questionnaire

The Questionnaire collects information on many topics, including the following:

Background characteristics: question on age, gender, marital status, education, income, occupation, media exposure, religion, and caste/tribe etc.

Questions on electoral participation and voting behavior.

Attitude, perception and opinions about politics and related issues

Legitimacy/Efficacy/Meaning of Democracy/ Support for Democracy

The questionnaire will be originally designed in English however the language of the administered questionnaire in the field will be in regional/local language.

Focused Group Discussions

For the focused group discussion we shall invite 20-25 participants. These young participants would be people from civil society organizations, political party members, student union leaders etc. The idea is to invite participants who are keenly interested in political activities. We would seek to have their opinion and views on youth politics in India.

Interview schedule with Young MPs of sampled constituencies

A detailed interview of Members of Parliament of all sampled constituencies would be carried out as part of this study. This interview would enable us to deeply probe the dynamics of young parliamentarians. We would deeply probe about their campaign strategy and role of young voters in their victory.

Dissemination of Research Output

Findings of the research will be presented in a half-day work shop/evening event with journalists, academicians, policy makers, political leaders and other concerned citizens. This would also be the event for releasing the report. Thereafter or before the release, CSDS would endeavour to get this report professionally designed and published by a reputed Publishing House.

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