In this episode, we spoke to Milan Vaishnav, the host of the popular podcasts ‘Grand Tamasha’ about the criminalisation of politics. Most Indians are familiar with the phenomenon of politicians with criminal records and appear to have accepted their participation in the democratic process . In today’s episode, Milan helped us unpack this uneasy balance by exploring why political parties give tickets to criminals, why people continue to vote for them and whether this status quo is likely to change.

 

If you like our podcast do consider supporting us with a donation at the link below: https://www.dakshindia.org/donate/

 

Reading list:

1. Milan Vaishnav. When crime pays: Money and muscle in Indian politics. Yale University Press, 2017

2. James Crabtree, Lunch with the FT: Raghuram Rajan. Financial Times August 15 2014 https://www.ft.com/content/b049ce16-230e-11e4-a424-00144feabdc0#axzz3B60Xysad

3. Association for Democratic Reform https://adrindia.org/

 

CREDITS:

Host: Leah Verghese

This is a Maed in India production.

Producer: Nikkethana K

Sound Mixing: Lakshman Parsuram

Project Supervisor: Shaun Fanthome