BBC: India's Model Democracy

[liberalpragmatist]

India's model democracy
By Mukul Kesavan



India is an unique democracy

<snip>

If we confine ourselves to South Asia, the most striking difference between India and the other countries in the region is that Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, Bhutan and Sri Lanka are countries formally owned by their dominant religious communities.

An important democratic lesson from the recent history of South Asia is that a democracy that creates two different kinds of citizen rapidly evolves into something else.

India didn't go down this road for reasons of history.

Pluralist nationalism in the 19th century was invented as an answer to the specific challenges of contemporary colonialism. It was founded on the claim that the anti-colonial Indian National Congress could speak for the nation-in-the-making because its membership included representatives of all of India's human species.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/6943598.stm

The article continues and makes some excellent points about democracy, pluralism and even Iraq. Well worth a read on this date, India's 60th.