NCERT Solutions Class 8 Social Science Chapter 5 Universal Franchise and India s Electoral System

F R E E S T U D Y M AT E R I A L F O R E V E R Y S T U D E N T

CLASS 8 · SOCIAL SCIENCE

NCERT Solutions

Chapter 5: Universal Franchise
and India’s Electoral System

NCERT Textbook — Exploring Society: India And Beyond

BOOK PAGES SECTIONS QUESTIONS MEDIUM

117 – 138 15 34 English

Solutions, notes, sample papers & more at 43 pages

Class 8 Social Science Chapter 5 Universal Franchise and India’s Electoral System AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

CLASS 8 · SOCIAL SCIENCE · EXPLORING SOCIETY: INDIA AND BEYOND

NCERT Solutions — Chapter 5: Universal Franchise and
India’s Electoral System
Complete NCERT Solutions for Class 8 Social Science Chapter 5 Universal Franchise and India’s Electoral
System, from Exploring Society: India and Beyond, Grade 8 Part 1 (theme: Governance and Democracy). Every
question in the chapter is answered — The Big Questions, all eleven LET’S EXPLORE boxes, the DON’T MISS
OUT question on page 133, the THINK ABOUT IT box, the two in-text questions, and all nine Questions and
activities — with the mindmap (Fig. 5.4), the ECI structure chart (Fig. 5.11), the scale figures (Fig. 5.12), the
polling-day sequence (Fig. 5.13), the reserved-seats pie chart and the Rajya Sabha panel (Fig. 5.23) read
directly off the printed page.

TEXTBOOK BOOK PAGES

Exploring Society: India and Beyond (Class 8) 117 – 138

SECTIONS QUESTIONS

15 34

MEDIUM

English

The Big Questions — Page 117
Chapter opening — theme: Governance and Democracy

THE BIG QUESTIONS

Q1 What is universal adult franchise?

Universal adult franchise means that every adult citizen gets one vote, and all votes have equal
value. In India that means every citizen aged 18 and above has the right to vote — irrespective
of caste, creed, race, religion, gender, education, income, and so on. The word ‘universal’
carries exactly this: no group of adults is left out.
Take the three words separately, because each one is doing work:

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Class 8 Social Science Chapter 5 Universal Franchise and India’s Electoral System AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

WORD WHAT IT RULES OUT WHY IT MATTERS

Universal Any bar based on caste, creed, race, A poor, unlettered farm labourer and a wealthy professor
religion, gender, education or income cast one vote each, and the two votes count the same

Adult A vote for children 18 is the age at which the Constitution treats a citizen as
able to make this choice; India lowered it from 21 to 18 in
1988

Franchise A favour that can be withdrawn at Franchise is a right granted by the constitution or
will government — here by Article 326. ‘Suffrage’ is a
synonym

Two practical conditions come with the right. First, you must be registered as a voter in your
constituency to exercise it. Second, a person found guilty of committing certain serious
crimes is barred from voting. And one rule protects it: no one can vote on another’s behalf.

Why it is called the cornerstone: elections to the Lok Sabha, to the legislative
assembly of every state and union territory, and all local elections in villages and
cities are all based on universal franchise. So the same principle runs from the gram
panchayat right up to Parliament. If it were removed at any one level, that level
would stop being answerable to the people.

Q2 What is an electoral system?

An electoral system is the whole arrangement by which citizens choose their
representatives — the rules, the institutions and the people who run them, working together.
The chapter’s own margin note defines a system as “a group of interconnected or
interdependent elements that work together to achieve a common purpose or function”, and an
electoral system is exactly that: many parts whose common purpose is a free and fair
election.
Read the chapter and you can list the parts:

Rules — universal adult franchise (Article 326), the secret ballot, ‘First-Past-the-Post’
counting, the reservation of seats, the Model Code of Conduct.
Institutions — the Election Commission of India, and the State Election Commissions for
local bodies.
Machinery on the ground — the voter list, constituencies, polling stations, polling officers,
EVMs and VVPATs, indelible ink, counting halls.
Participants — voters, candidates and political parties, all bound by the same rules.

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Class 8 Social Science Chapter 5 Universal Franchise and India’s Electoral System AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

Why call it a system rather than a set of rules: because the parts depend on one
another. A perfect voter list is useless if polling stations cannot be reached; a secret
ballot is useless if a candidate can buy votes; an honest count is useless if the party
in power has spent public money to influence voters. Remove any one part and the
others cannot deliver a fair result on their own — which is precisely why the chapter
says India needs “an elaborate and well-organised system”.

Q3 How does India’s electoral system work?

It works at three levels, and it works differently for direct and indirect elections. Here is the
whole chapter in one view.
1. Who runs it. The Election Commission of India (ECI) — an independent constitutional body
set up in 1950. Its structure descends from the national level to the polling booth:

Election Commission of India

At national level At State/UT level At District level

Chief Election Commissioner Chief Electoral Officer District Election Officer

Two Election Commissioners
Returning Officer (RO) Electoral Registration
conducts elections Officer — voter list

Local body elections are managed by the State Election Commissions.

The structure of the Election Commission of India, as printed in Fig. 5.11 on page 127.

2. Direct elections — Lok Sabha and the state assemblies. The country is divided into 543
constituencies for the Lok Sabha. Every registered voter in a constituency casts one secret vote;
India uses ‘First-Past-the-Post’, so the candidate with the most votes wins even without 50 per
cent. Winners are called MPs (Lok Sabha) and MLAs (state assemblies). The party or coalition
with a majority of seats forms the government, and its leader becomes prime minister — or
chief minister in a state.
3. On polling day the voter passes four steps: the 1st polling officer checks the name on the
voter list and the ID proof; the 2nd inks the finger, gives a chit and takes the signature; the 3rd
takes the chit and checks the finger (NOTA is available); then the voter presses the button on the

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Class 8 Social Science Chapter 5 Universal Franchise and India’s Electoral System AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

EVM, hears a beep, and checks the printed slip in the VVPAT.
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voters, 543 constituencies and over 1 million polling stations in 2024 — is what
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LET’SsEXPLORE
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— Page 118
Universal Adult Franchise

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LET'S EXPLORE

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a gl age for voting from 21 to 18 in 1988. Discuss whether
India changed the minimum
this was a good move.

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On balance it was a good move, and the strongest reason is consistency: an 18-year-old is
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ARGUMENTS FOR LOWERING IT TO 18 ARGUMENTS THAT WERE RAISED

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AGAINST
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At 18 a citizen can be held fully responsible in law and can take up Some felt an 18-year-old is still in school or
work. If society trusts a person with those duties, it should trust them
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college and may vote as parents or friends

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with a vote tell them to

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India is a young country. Excluding 18–20-year-olds left out a very Some felt three more years of study and

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work experience would produce a more

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Voting is itself a school for citizenship. The earlier a person starts, the Political parties might target the young with

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more likely voting becomes a lifelong habit promises aimed at them alone

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It fits the logic of universal franchise: the fewer the exclusions, the A larger electorate makes an already
closer the electorate is to the whole adult people gigantic election even harder to manage

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Class 8 Social Science Chapter 5 Universal Franchise and India’s Electoral System AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

Why the ‘they are not ready’ argument is weak: it is the same argument that was
made in 1947 about unlettered voters — that only literate people should vote. The
Constitution makers rejected it then, because a right that is given only to those
someone else judges ‘ready’ stops being a right. If we accept the maturity test at 18,
we would have to accept it at 21, at 25, and for other groups too. India instead chose
a single, clear, equal rule.

Tip for the discussion: notice that this change did not weaken any safeguard. An
18-year-old still has to be registered in a constituency, still votes by secret ballot, and
still cannot vote on anyone else’s behalf. Widening the franchise and keeping the
process strict are two separate things.

In-text Questions — Page 118
Universal Adult Franchise

Q1 Can you calculate how long you have to wait before you can vote?

Subtract your present age from 18 — and then check whether your birthday falls before the
qualifying date for the voter list. That is the whole calculation, but the second half is the part
students usually miss.

Years to wait = 18 − (your age today)

Example: if you are 13 years and 4 months old today → 18 − 13 = 5 years, minus the 4

months already completed

→ you turn 18 in about 4 years and 8 months

Most Class 8 students are 13 or 14, so the answer is usually about four to five years before
turning 18 — and then a little longer before the first election you can actually vote in, because
two more things must happen:

You must be registered as a voter in your constituency. The chapter is explicit: “To be able
to exercise your right, you need to be registered as a voter in your constituency.”
Registration is done by the Electoral Registration Officer, who manages the voter list.
An election must actually fall due. A Lok Sabha election normally comes once in five years,
and your state assembly election on its own cycle, so the first time you vote may be for a
panchayat, a municipal body, an assembly or the Lok Sabha — whichever comes first after

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Class 8 Social Science Chapter 5 Universal Franchise and India’s Electoral System AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

you turn 18.

Try this: work out the year in which you turn 18, then find out from an adult when
the next Lok Sabha election and the next assembly election in your state are due.
Which one will be your first vote?

LET’S EXPLORE — Page 120
Universal Adult Franchise — the literacy argument of 1947

LET'S EXPLORE

Q1 In 1947, our literacy rate was about 14 per cent, only about 8 per cent among
women. Some argued that the right to vote should be given only to literate people.
Discuss in your group why the Constitution makers may have decided on universal
franchise from the time of Independence itself.

Because a literacy test would have handed the new republic straight back to the small
class that colonial rule had already privileged — and would have left about 86 out of every
100 Indians, and 92 out of every 100 women, with no voice at all. The Constitution makers
had lived through exactly that: before Independence around 13 per cent of Indians were
allowed to vote, and franchise was not universal. Universal franchise was a deliberate break with
that.
The reasons they may have weighed, in order of force:

1. Low literacy was a result of colonial rule, not a fault of the people. Punishing Indians for
a deprivation the colonial state had produced would have been doubly unjust.
2. Being unlettered is not the same as being unable to judge. A farmer knows whether the
canal was repaired, whether the ration reached the village, whether the school has a teacher.
That knowledge is what a vote records.
3. The people most in need of representation would have been excluded. The poor, women,
and the communities kept out of schooling for generations are precisely those whose
problems most need a hearing in a legislature.
4. A test can always be stretched. Once you accept literacy as a filter, someone can add
property, or income, or education, and the electorate shrinks and shrinks. A clear, universal
rule closes that door.
5. Legitimacy. A government elected by one-seventh of the adults could not credibly claim to
speak for the nation, and India needed the new Constitution to be accepted by everyone.
6. Trust as a founding decision. Alladi Krishnaswami Ayyar, quoted at the head of the chapter,
described it as adopting adult franchise “with an abundant faith in the common man and the
ultimate success of democratic rule”.

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Class 8 Social Science Chapter 5 Universal Franchise and India’s Electoral System AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

Why the experiment worked: the system was designed around the voter as she
was, not as some ideal. Candidates were given symbols, so a voter who could not
read a name could still identify a party; the ballot was secret; polling officers were
there to guide. Rights were extended first, and the machinery was built to make
them usable — not the other way round.

Did you know? India also gave women the vote from the very beginning, when
many older democracies had not. Women in Switzerland got the right to vote only in
1971 — more than twenty years after Indian women were already voting.

In-text Questions — Page 120
Fig. 5.4 — Importance of universal franchise in a democracy

Q1 There are several reasons why universal franchise is so important. A few are
illustrated in the mindmap below. Can you add some more?

First, read what the mindmap already gives you (Fig. 5.4, page 120), because your two
additions should not repeat these. Around the centre “Why universal adult franchise?” the book
prints five branches:

BRANCH IN THE MINDMAP WHAT THE BOOK ADDS ON THE OUTSIDE

Everyone is equal No discrimination based on caste, creed, sex, education, wealth
etc.

Everyone’s voice matters All can participate in deciding the nation’s future

Elected representatives answerable to People vote them out in elections
electorate

Power to determine one’s future People decide what type of future they want and who can best
represent them

Fosters civic engagement People participate in solving problems in their area

Two reasons of your own for the empty boxes — each one should be a reason that follows
from everyone voting, not merely from voting:

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Class 8 Social Science Chapter 5 Universal Franchise and India’s Electoral System AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

YOUR BOX THE REASON, IN ONE WHY IT BELONGS HERE
LINE

Peaceful change Power changes hands by Because every adult has a stake in the ballot, a losing
of government counting votes instead of by side has a legitimate route back — the next election
force — instead of a reason to fight

Policies must A party that ignores the poor, When no group can be struck off the roll, no group
serve everyone women or a small community can be safely ignored; universal franchise puts every
loses their votes community inside the calculation

Other defensible additions: it builds a sense of belonging — a citizen who votes feels the
country is hers; it protects minorities, since numbers alone no longer decide who may
participate; and it trains citizens, because voting forces people to find out what candidates
actually stand for.

Tip: a good mindmap box is short — four to six words — with the explanation in the
outer bubble, exactly as the book does it.

LET’S EXPLORE — Page 121
Bridging Barriers, Enabling Participation: Ensuring Universal Franchise

LET'S EXPLORE

Q1 Discuss in groups — What role do such measures play in a democracy? Do you know
of anyone who benefited from these improved accessibility measures? How might
they increase voter participation in your neighbourhood? How can technology
assist?

Their role is to close the gap between having the right to vote and being able to use it.
Universal franchise on paper means nothing to a voter who is 95 years old and cannot reach a
booth three kilometres away, or to a blind voter who cannot read a ballot, or to a wheelchair
user facing a flight of steps. The measures listed in the chapter turn a right into a usable right.
What the ECI actually did (page 121, and shown in Fig. 5.6 on page 122):

Electoral officials travel to remote locations so that every citizen can exercise their
democratic right — including, as the caption to Fig. 5.6 records, organising a polling
station for a single woman voter.
In 2024, for the first time, the elderly and people with disabilities could cast their votes
from home.
Postal voting was available for a specific category of voters.

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Braille-enabled voter cards, and app-based requests for assistance including wheelchairs
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and ramps.
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Why this is a democratic question and not just a convenience: if the elderly, the
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adisabled and people in remote areas vote less than others, then legislatures hear
less from them — and policies drift towards the groups that do turn out. Accessibility

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measures keep the electorate a true picture of the people. That is the same principle

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How they might increase participation in your neighbourhood — and this is the part to

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Ramps, seating and a shaded queue make a long wait bearable for the very old.
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Home voting removes the single biggest barrier for a bedridden voter — the journey.

a s em on the ground floor, and volunteers to help, mean a family need not choose between
Booths

a gl taking a grandparent to vote and going to work.
Simply knowing that these facilities exist matters: many people do not vote because they

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assume they cannot.
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How technology can assist: app-based

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alerts about polling date, booth location
your name in the voter list; braille and audio-enabled information; and the EVM–VVPAT
combination itself, which lets a voter confirm the vote without needing to read a long ballot
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Method

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home voting or postal voting. Record the answers as a small table. Sample answer:

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“My grandmother, who is 84 and cannot walk far, voted from home in 2024 after an
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If you have access to the internet, visit the ECI website
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(https://www.eci.gov.in/persons-with-disabilities). Read and

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Class 8 Social Science Chapter 5 Universal Franchise and India’s Electoral System AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

Method: open the page, and read it looking for four kinds of intervention — (i) getting to the
booth, (ii) getting inside it, (iii) casting the vote, and (iv) information before polling day. Note
each one in your own words with a short line on which barrier it removes. That last column is
what turns a list into an answer.

KIND OF INTERVENTIONS THE CHAPTER ITSELF WHAT TO LOOK FOR ON THE
BARRIER NAMES ECI PAGE

Reaching the Home voting for persons with disabilities and the Free transport to the polling station;
booth elderly (from 2024); postal voting for a specific priority entry so a disabled voter
category of voters; officials travelling to remote need not stand in a long queue
locations

Entering the App-based requests for assistance, including Ramps at every polling station,
booth wheelchairs and ramps ground-floor booths, accessible
toilets, volunteers on duty

Casting the Braille-enabled voter cards; the EVM with its VVPAT Braille on the EVM ballot unit; the
vote slip option of a companion for a voter
who cannot mark the vote; sign-
language help

Information The ECI’s own accessibility pages and app Videos with sign language and
subtitles; the accessibility app
through which a request can be
booked in advance

Why the ECI treats this as its own duty: the right under Article 326 belongs to
every adult citizen. If a disabled citizen cannot use it, the failure is the system’s, not
hers. So the Commission — not the voter — is expected to remove the barrier. This is
the reasoning behind the chapter’s sentence that the ECI has taken measures “to
ensure no voter is left behind”.

If you do not have internet access: you can still answer well from the chapter.
Write down the five interventions the book itself names (home voting, postal voting,
braille-enabled voter cards, app-based requests, wheelchairs and ramps), and add
what you have actually seen at a polling station near you. Then check your list
against the website when you can.

LET’S EXPLORE — Page 123

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Class 8 Social Science Chapter 5 Universal Franchise and India’s Electoral System AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

Bridging Barriers, Enabling Participation — voter turnout in 2024

LET'S EXPLORE

Q1 About 34 per cent of eligible voters did not exercise their right to vote in the 2024
elections. Why do you think this is so? What are some challenges people face in
exercising their rights? Design and conduct a short survey among adults in your
family and neighbourhood to answer these questions. Analyse the data and write a
report with suggestions on how it may be possible to ensure everyone votes.

Start with the number. About 968 million voters were eligible in 2024, so 34 per cent not
voting means roughly one in three eligible Indians — about 329 million people — did not
cast a vote. That is larger than the entire population of most countries, which is why the
chapter treats it as a serious question about the health of the democracy.

34% of 968 million

= 0.34 × 968 = 329.1 million

→ about 66 per cent did vote — roughly two out of every three

Why people do not vote — group the reasons, because the remedies differ:

KIND OF REASON EXAMPLES WHAT WOULD ACTUALLY
FIX IT

Practical Migrant workers registered in a home village Postal and home voting; a paid
hundreds of kilometres away; polling day is holiday enforced; registration where
a working day and daily-wage loss is real; a person actually lives
illness or old age; the booth is far

Administrative Name missing or misspelt in the voter list; Online checking and correction of
no ID proof; never registered after moving the roll; door-to-door verification
city drives

Attitude — this is “My one vote will not change anything”; “all Awareness campaigns; showing local
what the chapter calls candidates are the same”; urban voters in results decided by small margins;
voter apathy particular treat polling day as a holiday explaining NOTA as the honest
alternative to staying home

Information Not knowing the date, the booth, or what the SMS and app alerts; candidate
candidates stand for information published by the ECI;
school and college voter-awareness
drives

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Class 8 Social Science Chapter 5 Universal Franchise and India’s Electoral System AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

Designing the survey — a workable plan:

1. Sample: 10–15 adults across at least two households besides your own, mixing ages (a
young adult, a middle-aged worker, an elderly person) and both women and men. Note age
group and gender only — not names.
2. Questions, kept short: (i) Did you vote in the last election? (ii) If not, what was the main
reason? (iii) How far is your polling station? (iv) Was your name correctly in the voter list? (v)
What one change would make it easier for you to vote?
3. Analysis: tally the reasons and rank them. Work out the percentage who voted, and
compare it with the national figure of about 66 per cent.
4. Report: one page — the method, a small table of results, the top three reasons, and three
suggestions that follow from your own data, not from a general list.

Sample finding (write your own from real answers): “Of the 12 adults surveyed, 9
voted. Of the 3 who did not, 2 said their names were not on the list and 1 was
working outside the state. Suggestion: a voter-list verification camp in our locality
two months before polling.”

Why ‘everyone must vote’ needs care as a conclusion: the right to vote is a right,
and India does not make voting compulsory. So the honest aim of your suggestions
is to remove every obstacle in the way of a citizen who wants to vote, and to
persuade the one who does not see the point — not to force anyone. That is also
why NOTA exists: it lets a dissatisfied voter register the dissatisfaction inside the
system instead of walking away from it.

LET’S EXPLORE — Page 125
Election for class representative — Grade 8, Suryodaya School

LET'S EXPLORE

Q1 What are the most important aspects of the election process in this caselet?

The caselet is a miniature of a real Indian election, and every stage in it matches
something the ECI does. That correspondence is the point of the story.

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Class 8 Social Science Chapter 5 Universal Franchise and India’s Electoral System AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

IN THE CLASSROOM THE SAME THING IN A WHY IT MATTERS
GENERAL ELECTION

A neutral Election Officer — Ms. Usha, The Election Commission of The person who runs the
appointed to ensure the process was fair, India — an independent contest must not be one of
transparent and followed the rules constitutional body the contestants

Open contest — Ahmed, Gurmat and Ravi Any eligible citizen may contest; Voters must have a real
could all stand parties are registered by the ECI choice

Campaigning on issues — cleanliness, Manifestos and campaign Voters decide on stated
peer coaching, more space for the arts speeches, bounded by the Model ideas, not on inducements
Code of Conduct

The rules explained to everyone in The ECI publishes the schedule No one can later claim they
advance and the rules; the MCC applies did not know
to all parties equally

Secret ballot in booths set up in a corner of Polling booths, screened voting No one knows who voted
the class compartments for whom — so no one can
be pressured

Accessibility — a ballot paper in braille for Braille-enabled voter cards, The right is useless if a voter
Neha ramps, home voting cannot physically use it

Sealed ballot box kept until the counting Sealed EVMs kept in strong Votes cannot be added or
session rooms under guard removed between polling
and counting

Counting before a witness — Ms. Sheeba Counting in the presence of Transparency; the result can
from the next class candidates’ agents and observers be trusted because it was
watched

Invalid votes set aside, and results Rejected votes recorded; results The rules are applied visibly
announced openly declared publicly by the and to everyone alike
Returning Officer

The losers accept the result — Ahmed and The defeated parties accept the This is what makes the
Ravi congratulated Gurmat and offered verdict and sit in opposition peaceful transfer of power
support possible

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Why the last row is the most important of all: everything else can be arranged by

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officials. Whether the losing side accepts the count cannot. An election settles a
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acceptance.
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Why was it important to have a secret ballot?

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Because it

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Work through what would happen without it, in the classroom itself:
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A student whose close friend is contesting would find it hard to vote for anyone else, agl
knowing the friend would see the mark.
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A popular or physically stronger candidate could pressure classmates, and check afterwards
whether they obeyed.

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Students who had voted for the loser could be teased, excluded or troubled afterwards.

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The result would then measure who was most feared or most obliged,

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The same argument scales up to a general election. A vote that can be traced back is a vote that

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or a local strongman. This is why the polling station has a screened compartment, why the EVM
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records only a total for each candidate and never who pressed the button, and why the printed
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Why secrecy and transparency are not opposites here: the choice is secret; the

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process is completely open. The candidates knew the rules, a witness watched the

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counting, and the totals were announced publicly. Secrecy protects

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protects the result. An election needs both.

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Did you know? Secrecy also protects the loser’s supporters. Because no one can
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prove who voted against the winner, the winner has no list to act on — which is one
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reason a defeated side can safely accept the outcome and, as Ahmed and Ravi did,
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Q3 What considerations might the students have had while exercising their choice?

Different students would have weighed different things, and the caselet gives enough
detail to reconstruct several of them. The three candidates offered genuinely different
programmes:

CANDIDATE WHAT WAS PROMISED WHO WOULD FIND IT MOST
ATTRACTIVE

Ahmed Improve the cleanliness of the classrooms Students who play outdoors, or who are
and the playground troubled by an untidy classroom — a visible,
everyday benefit for all

Gurmat Help all classmates learn better, through peer Students struggling in a subject, and those
coaching and mutual support willing to teach — it offers something to nearly
everyone in the class

Ravi More space in the timetable for the arts — Students interested in the arts; it appeals
music, theatre, visual art — in line with the strongly but to a narrower group
new curriculum

Beyond the promises, students would reasonably have considered:

Is the promise realistic? A class representative can organise peer coaching within the class;
changing the timetable needs the school’s agreement.
How many classmates does it help? Gurmat’s idea reached the whole class directly —
which may be part of why she won.
Can this person actually do the job? The Class Rep has to represent the class in meetings
with teachers, organise events and act as a bridge — so reliability and the confidence to
speak to teachers matter as much as the idea.
How they campaigned. Gurmat used the noticeboard and spoke to classmates — a two-way
approach. Ahmed used posters; Ravi gave a lunchtime music performance, which showed
his talent but also mainly showcased his own interest.
Friendship and familiarity, honestly — students do vote for people they know and like.

Why it is worth separating these: the first three considerations are about the
class’s interest; the last is about the voter’s own comfort. A thoughtful voter — at
school or in a general election — asks which of the two is guiding the hand. The
chapter’s closing section makes exactly this point when it says the way forward lies
in “empowering voters with the information they need to make thoughtful and
responsible choices”.

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Class 8 Social Science Chapter 5 Universal Franchise and India’s Electoral System AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

Q4 Do you think the students have any responsibility after Gurmat was elected as the
class rep? If yes, what are they?

Yes — and this is the responsibility most people forget. Voting is where a citizen’s work
begins, not where it ends. Gurmat has become answerable to the class; that answerability only
exists if the class actually holds her to it.
What the students owe her:

Accept the result and cooperate, including those who voted for Ahmed or Ravi — as
Ahmed and Ravi themselves did when they congratulated her and offered to support her.
Take part in what she has promised. Peer coaching only works if classmates turn up to
teach and to be taught. A representative cannot deliver alone.
Give her the information she needs to represent the class truthfully in meetings with
teachers.

What the students owe themselves:

Follow up on the promise. Ask, after a month, whether the peer-coaching system has
actually started.
Raise problems with her rather than complaining among themselves — that is what a
bridge between students and school authorities is for.
Judge her fairly by what a class representative can actually control, and remember it at the
next election.

Why this matters beyond the classroom: the mindmap on page 120 lists “Elected
representatives answerable to electorate”, and the outer bubble explains how:
“People vote them out in elections.” But that sanction only bites if voters have
watched what the representative did. The chapter’s last section says the same thing
about the country — “An aware and vigilant voter is the strongest safeguard of a
democratic system.” Five minutes in a polling booth once in five years is not enough;
the watching in between is what makes those five minutes powerful.

Q5 What was the role that Ms. Usha played? Why was it important?

Ms. Usha was the Election Officer — appointed “to ensure the election process was fair,
transparent, and followed all the necessary rules”. In the school she is what the Election
Commission of India is in the country.
What she actually did, step by step:

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1. Explained the rules to the class, making sure everyone understood how the secret ballot
voting process would work.
2. Set up the voting booths in a corner of the classroom, so votes could be cast privately.
3. Ensured accessibility — she arranged a ballot paper in braille for Neha.
4. Conducted the poll and handed each student a ballot paper listing the three candidates.
5. Secured the ballots — she collected them in a box and sealed it until the counting session.
6. Brought in an independent witness, Ms. Sheeba from the next class, to observe the
counting.
7. Applied the rules to the count — an unmarked ballot was declared invalid — and
announced the results.

Why the role was important — three separate reasons:
1. Neutrality. She was not a candidate and had nothing to gain from any result, so
no one could suspect the count.
2. Equal treatment. The same rules applied to all three candidates and to every
voter, including the rule that unmarked ballots are invalid.
3. Trust in the outcome. Because a neutral officer ran it and an outsider witnessed
the count, Ahmed and Ravi could accept defeat without believing they had been
cheated. Without her, a losing candidate could always claim the box had been
tampered with — and the class would have no way to prove otherwise.

Compare: this is exactly why the chapter stresses that the ECI is an independent
constitutional body. If elections were run by the party in power, every result would
be open to the same suspicion — which is also why the Model Code of Conduct
forbids the government of the day from using state resources for its campaign.

Q6 Why was it important for Ms. Usha to organise a braille ballot paper for Neha?

Because without it Neha would have had the right to vote but no way of using it — and
worse, she would have had to tell someone else her choice, losing the secrecy every other
student enjoyed.
Three things the braille ballot protected at once:

Equality. Universal franchise means every voter counts equally. If one student needs a
different format to cast the same vote, providing it is not a favour — it is what equality
requires.

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Class 8 Social Science Chapter 5 Universal Franchise and India’s Electoral System AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

Secrecy. Had Neha needed a classmate to read the names and mark the paper for her, that
classmate would have known her choice, and could have influenced or reported it. The
braille paper let her vote in private, like everyone else.
Dignity and participation. A voter who must ask for help each time slowly stops taking part.
An accessible ballot says she belongs in the process on her own terms.

Why this is not a small detail: it is the classroom version of what the ECI does
nationally. The chapter records braille-enabled voter cards, app-based requests for
wheelchairs and ramps, home voting for the elderly and people with disabilities
from 2024, and a polling station arranged for a single woman voter (Fig. 5.6). The
principle behind all of them is the one Ms. Usha applied: the system must bend to
reach the voter, because the right belongs to the voter and the duty of making it
usable belongs to the system.

Tip: notice that Ms. Usha arranged this in advance, not when Neha arrived at the
booth. Accessibility planned beforehand is inclusion; accessibility improvised on the
day is usually too late.

Q7 What would happen if many students in the class chose not to mark a preference?

The election would still produce a winner, but a much weaker one — chosen by a small
fraction of the class, with the rest having said nothing at all. Work it out with the caselet’s
own numbers.

Votes cast = 33

Unmarked ballot papers → declared invalid

Ahmed 8 + Gurmat 12 + Ravi 10 = 30 valid votes

Winner: Gurmat, with 12 of 33 → about 36 per cent of those who voted

Now suppose 20 of the 33 had left the paper blank. Only 13 valid votes would remain, and a
candidate could win with 5 or 6 — less than one-fifth of the class. Four consequences follow:

The winner’s mandate shrinks. A representative supported by a fifth of the class has little
authority when she speaks to teachers “on behalf of the class”.
Small groups decide the outcome. The fewer the valid votes, the easier it is for a handful of
friends to swing the result.

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The class loses its own voice. Those who did not mark a preference have not stopped the
co m
winner — they have only stopped themselves from influencing which winner it is.
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But it does send a signal. A large number of blank papers tells everyone that the students

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Why this leads straight to NOTA: the DON’T MISS OUT box on the same page asks

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what a student who does not want to vote for Ahmed, Gurmat or Ravi should do.

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Some countries, including India, offer NOTA — None Of The Above. It lets a voter ag
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formally reject all candidates. It doesn’t change the result, but unlike a blank paper
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it is recorded — it sends the message that voters want better choices. That is the

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difference between silence and a deliberate, counted refusal: NOTA is, as the book
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says, “a quiet but powerful tool in a democracy”.

m as e
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a s em the arithmetic in your book: 8 + 12 + 10 = 30, and 33 votes were cast — so
Check

a gl three ballot papers must have been invalid. The Hindi edition of this chapter prints
exactly that (“3 मतप ों पर िचह्न अंि कत नही ं था”); the English edition says “one of the ballot
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papers was not marked”, which does not add up. Take the count as 33 cast, 3 invalid,
30 valid.
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LET’S EXPLORE — Page 128
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Managing the electoral process
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LET'S EXPLORE

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Identify teachers in your school or vicinity who may have performed election duty.
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This is a field activity. Here is how to run it, and what a good record of it must contain.

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Why teachers, of all people? Because of the scale printed in Fig. 5.12 — about 968 million
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voters, 543 parliamentary constituencies and over 1 million polling stations in 2024. Each
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the country, and are government servants who can be lawfully deputed.
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Over 1,000,000 polling stations

× about 4 officers per station

→ roughly 4 million polling personnel for a single general election

How to do it:

1. Find them. Ask your class teacher or head teacher which staff members have done election
duty; also ask family and neighbours, since bank staff and other government employees are
deployed too.
2. Ask permission through your teacher, and fix a convenient period.
3. Prepare questions in advance — an unprepared interview wastes the guest’s time.
4. Take notes and write a short report for the class noticeboard.

Questions worth asking:

What exactly was your duty — 1st, 2nd or 3rd polling officer, or presiding officer?
What training did you receive, and how long before polling day?
How did you reach the polling station, and how were the EVMs transported and kept
overnight?
What checks did you make on each voter, and what did you do if a name was missing from
the list?
What happened at the close of poll — how were the machines sealed?
What was hardest? What surprised you? Did you see the accessibility measures being used?

Sample answer (write your own from a real interview): “Shri Ramesh Kumar, our
science teacher, was the 2nd polling officer at a village booth in 2024. He was trained
twice, reached the booth the previous evening with a sealed EVM, inked about 700
fingers over eleven hours, and says the hardest part was explaining to two voters
whose names had been dropped from the list that he could not let them vote —
which is why he now tells everyone to check the roll early.”

Why this activity is in the chapter at all: it makes the abstract word ‘system’
concrete. A student who has heard a teacher describe sealing an EVM at 6 p.m.
understands, far better than from a diagram, why an election of this size needs a
chain of command from the Chief Election Commissioner down to a Returning
Officer — and why the chapter calls managing it “a mammoth task”.

LET’S EXPLORE — Page 131

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Class 8 Social Science Chapter 5 Universal Franchise and India’s Electoral System AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

Model Code of Conduct — types of complaints the ECI handles (Figs. 5.17–5.20)

LET'S EXPLORE

Q1 Here are a few types of complaints that the ECI handles. Why do you think these
might be violations of the code of conduct?

All four break the same underlying rule: an election must be won by persuading voters, on
equal terms with every other candidate. Each picture shows a different way of getting round
that. Here is what the four figures on page 131 show, and why each is a violation.

FIGURE WHAT IT SHOWS WHY IT VIOLATES THE MODEL CODE OF CONDUCT

Fig. 5.17 A candidate distributed sarees This is buying votes with gifts. The code states plainly that
and household appliances to “influencing voters through gifts in return for votes is punishable”.
women voters It also destroys equality between candidates — a rich candidate
could simply outspend an honest one

Fig. 5.18 Abusive language used by the The code requires all candidates to “exercise discretion and
candidate of one party against restraint to ensure that the elections take place peacefully”. Abuse
the candidate of an opposing can inflame supporters and turn a contest of ideas into a quarrel —
party or worse, into violence

Fig. 5.19 Officials of the government Government servants are paid by the public and must serve every
campaigning for the ruling citizen. The code’s first element is that the party in government
party must not use the resources available to the government for election
purposes — and officials are among the most powerful of those
resources

Fig. 5.20 Bundles of ₹500 notes found Large unexplained cash during an election points to vote-buying or
in the car of a candidate during unaccounted campaign spending, and is exactly what the chapter
inspections later calls the growing influence of money in elections. Strict
vigilance on candidates’ spending was one of T.N. Seshan’s reforms

The common principle: a vote is meant to record what the voter judges to be best. A
gift replaces judgement with obligation; abuse replaces it with anger; a government
officer campaigning replaces it with the fear or hope of official favour; and
unaccounted money buys all three. In each case the count still happens, but it no
longer measures what the people think — and the whole purpose of the election is
lost.

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Class 8 Social Science Chapter 5 Universal Franchise and India’s Electoral System AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

Did you know? The Model Code of Conduct began as a voluntary agreement — it
was adopted in Kerala in 1960, approved by the representatives of the major
political parties of the time. The ECI circulated it to parties during the 1962 general
elections, and from 1991 the ECI became proactive in ensuring it is observed. So a
set of self-imposed courtesies grew into a nationally enforced discipline.

LET’S EXPLORE — Page 132
After the DON’T MISS OUT box on T.N. Seshan

LET'S EXPLORE

Q1 When is the next election in the region where you are located? Is it to the state,
urban local body or panchayat?

This has a different answer in every place, so here is how to find yours reliably — and what
the answer must include to be complete.
Where to look:

The Election Commission of India announces the schedule for Lok Sabha and state
assembly elections. Its website and press notes carry the dates.
Your State Election Commission announces panchayat and urban local body elections —
the chapter is clear that these are managed by the State Election Commissions, working in
consultation with the ECI.
Local newspapers, and the office of the District Election Officer, will have the
announcement once the schedule is declared.

What your answer should state:

1. Which body the election is to — Lok Sabha, your state legislative assembly, a municipal
corporation / municipality / nagar panchayat, or a gram panchayat, panchayat samiti or zila
parishad.
2. When — the month and year the term of the present body ends, since an election must be
held before that.
3. Who runs it — the ECI for the Lok Sabha and the assembly; the State Election Commission
for local bodies.
4. Whether you or your family can vote in it, and in which constituency or ward.

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Class 8 Social Science Chapter 5 Universal Franchise and India’s Electoral System AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

ELECTION NORMAL CONDUCTED BY YOU ELECT
TERM

Lok Sabha 5 years Election Commission of Your MP
India

State legislative assembly 5 years Election Commission of Your MLA
India

Urban local body (municipality, 5 years State Election Your ward councillor
corporation) Commission

Gram panchayat and other 5 years State Election Your ward member,
rural bodies Commission sarpanch

Why elections are spread out through the year: the chapter explains that all
elections take place at different times but with some periodicity, so every year
several polls are conducted in various parts of the country based on when they are
due. Each body’s five-year clock started when it was constituted, so the clocks are
not synchronised — which is exactly why the ECI and the State Election Commissions
are permanent bodies rather than committees set up once every five years.

Sample answer (replace with your own): “In our district the next election due is to
the gram panchayat, in about eight months, because the present panchayat
completes its five-year term then. It will be conducted by the State Election
Commission, and my parents will vote in ward 4 of our village.”

DON’T MISS OUT — Page 133
Election to the Lok Sabha and State Legislative Assemblies

DON'T MISS OUT

Q1 The legislative assembly is called by several names in regional languages, for
example, Vidhan Sabha and Niyama Sabha. What is it called in your state?

The answer depends on your state, so find out and write your own — but here is the
pattern, and why the names differ.
Everywhere in India the institution is the same: the elected house of a state or union territory,
whose members are MLAs chosen directly by the voters of assembly constituencies. Only the
name changes with the language.

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NAME LANGUAGE IT COMES WHERE YOU WILL HEAR IT

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FROM

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Vidhan Sabha Sanskrit/Hindi — vidhān (law) + The Hindi-speaking states and most of

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sabhā (assembly) northern, central and western India

Niyama Sabha Malayalam — niyamam (law) + Kerala — the example the book itself gives

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sabha

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Telugu / Odia — śāsana (rule, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Odisha

Sattamandram Tamil — sattam (law) + mandram Tamil Nadu
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Bidhan Kannada, Bengali and Odia Bidhan Sabha alongside Sasana Sabha

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Why the names differ but the institution does not: the Constitution creates one
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office and one procedure for every state; the words used are simply translations into
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each state’s own language. This is a small illustration of a larger Indian pattern — a
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common constitutional framework expressed in many languages, so that citizens
can deal with their own government in the language they actually speak.

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Tip: to be sure, look at the board outside your state’s assembly building, or at the
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a s em letterhead of a letter from an MLA. The official name is printed there in your state

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LET’S EXPLORE — Page 134 sem
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Election to the Lok Sabha and State Legislative Assemblies

LET'S EXPLORE

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Who are the MP and MLA / MLAs of the constituency you located in? (A Lok
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Find this out for your own area — but do it in the right order, because the bracketed hint

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in the question is the key to the

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Step 1 — identify your constituencies. You live in two at once: one parliamentary (Lok
Sabha) constituency and, inside it, one assembly constituency. The country is divided into
543 parliamentary constituencies; each of these contains two or more assembly constituencies,
because a state has far more MLAs than MPs.
Step 2 — find the names. Ask at home, look at the voter card of an adult in your family (it
names the assembly constituency), check a local newspaper, or look up the Election Commission
of India’s website.
Step 3 — write it up like this:

CONSTITUENCY REPRESENTATIVE ELECTED TO

MP Your parliamentary constituency Name Lok Sabha, New Delhi

MLA Your assembly constituency Name Your state / UT legislative assembly

Why one MP and several MLAs: a Lok Sabha constituency is far larger in population
than an assembly constituency, so it is divided into several of the latter. That is why a
single MP’s area may be represented by five, six or seven MLAs — and why the
question says “MLA / MLAs”. Your own vote goes to one MLA and one MP, but the MP
you elect also represents the voters of all the neighbouring assembly segments.

Sample answer (replace with your own): “Our parliamentary constituency has one
MP, and our assembly constituency lies inside it along with six other assembly
constituencies, each with its own MLA. I found the names of both on my mother’s
voter card and confirmed them from the ECI website.”

Q2 Which party does each of them belong to?

Look this up and record it factually. Two points make the answer complete rather than a
bare name.
Where to check: the ECI publishes the result of every constituency, showing each winning
candidate with the party on whose symbol he or she contested. A local newspaper’s result page,
or the assembly’s and Lok Sabha’s own member lists, will also carry it.
Point one — the MP and the MLA need not be from the same party. This is common and
completely normal: a voter may support one party for the state assembly and another for the
Lok Sabha, because the two bodies deal with different subjects. As the chapter puts it, MPs
focus on issues affecting the entire country, while MLAs focus primarily on regional issues.

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Class 8 Social Science Chapter 5 Universal Franchise and India’s Electoral System AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

Point two — a member may be from a party, or an independent. Political parties are
registered by the Election Commission of India — that is one of the four crucial tasks shown
in Fig. 5.9 — and each registered party has its own symbol. A candidate may also stand without
any party.

Why the party matters for what a representative can do: the party or coalition
winning a majority of seats in the Lok Sabha forms the national government, and the
leader of that majority typically becomes the prime minister; the same happens in a
state, where the leader of the majority party becomes chief minister. So a
representative from the governing party works from inside the government, while
one from another party works mainly through questioning, debate and opposition.
Both roles are part of how the legislature functions.

Write it neutrally. The task is to record which party each representative belongs to
— not to say which party is better. In a school exercise, state the fact and leave the
judgement to the voter.

Q3 What are the concerns of the MP and MLA, respectively?

The short answer is in the chapter’s own LET’S REMEMBER box: MPs deal with issues
affecting the entire country; MLAs focus primarily on regional issues. Fig. 5.22 says it in the
students’ own words: “MPs represent us in the national parliament, while MLAs represent us in
our state assembly. Both are chosen through similar electoral processes but work at different
levels of governance.”

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Class 8 Social Science Chapter 5 Universal Franchise and India’s Electoral System AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

MEMBER OF PARLIAMENT (MP) MEMBER OF LEGISLATIVE
ASSEMBLY (MLA)

Elected to The Lok Sabha — the lower house of Parliament The legislative assembly of a state or union
territory

Elected by Voters of one of the 543 parliamentary Voters of one assembly constituency, where
constituencies they are registered

Main Matters affecting the whole country — national Matters of the state and the locality — state
concerns laws and the budget, defence and foreign relations, laws, schools and hospitals in the state,
railways, national highways, and issues that cross roads, water supply, electricity, land and
state boundaries local development

Leader The leader of the majority party or coalition The leader of the majority party becomes
from this becomes the prime minister the chief minister
house

Why the concerns are divided this way: India is too large and too varied for every
decision to be taken in one place. Subjects that must be uniform across the country
— currency, defence, foreign policy — belong at the national level, where an MP
speaks. Subjects where local conditions differ — a canal, a district hospital, a state’s
school system — belong at the state level, where an MLA speaks. Universal adult
franchise runs through both, which is why a citizen elects a representative at each
level rather than one representative for everything.

Check it yourself: read a week of local news and sort the reported problems into
two columns — those your MLA could take up and those that need your MP. Water
supply in your ward, a state highway, a school appointment: MLA. Railway services, a
national scheme, import duties: MP. A few will land in both, which is itself worth
discussing.

THINK ABOUT IT — Page 136

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Election of the President of India

THINK ABOUT IT

Q1 Why do you think the above group of people is not involved in electing the
President of India? Why are the common people not involved in the election of the
president?

The chapter answers the first part itself: “It is because this ensures that only directly
elected representatives vote to elect the President. This maintains democratic legitimacy,
as the President is meant to represent the will of the people, indirectly but meaningfully.”
Let us unpack why that single rule explains the whole exclusion list, and then take the second
question.
Who is in the electoral college (page 136):

Members of Parliament from both Houses — the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha.
Members of the Legislative Assemblies of every state, and of the union territories of Delhi
and Puducherry.

Who is excluded, and why the exclusion follows one rule:

EXCLUDED GROUP WHY THEY ARE OUT

Nominated members of the They were appointed by the President, not elected by anyone. Letting them
Rajya Sabha (12) help choose the next President would let one office influence its own
succession

Nominated members of State Same reason — no voter chose them, so no chain of votes links them back to
Legislative Assemblies the people

Members of Legislative Councils A Legislative Council is the upper house of a state. Even its ‘elected’
in bicameral legislatures — both members are not elected by the general electorate — they are chosen by
elected and nominated special constituencies such as teachers, graduates and local bodies. So they
are not directly elected by the people

Nominated members of the Again, nominated rather than elected
assemblies of Delhi and
Puducherry

Read down that column and the rule is visible: only those whom the voters themselves put in
office may cast a vote for the President. Every excluded group failed that single test.
Why the common people are not involved directly. Several reasons work together:

The President is not a policy-making executive chosen to run a programme. The prime
minister, who leads the government, comes from the majority in the Lok Sabha — which the
people do elect directly. A separate nationwide popular election for the President could

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create a rival claim to popular authority alongside the prime minister, in a parliamentary
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system that is not built for two such claims.
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g the president
.c contains MLAs as well as MPs. As the chapter says, “Since
The President represents the whole country — the Union and the states. That is why the
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electoral college
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governments.”

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The single transferable vote system with weighted values. The rules for voting and
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counting are very elaborate, and the more populous states have a greater say. This careful

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balancing between states, and between Parliament and the states, is possible with a defined
ag
electoral college and would be impossible in a simple nationwide poll.
The chain of legitimacy is not broken, only lengthened. The people elect the MPs and

co m
m.
MLAs; those MPs and MLAs elect the President. So the President still holds office by the will
of the people — indirectly, but meaningfully.
m as e
.co a g l
a s em with the Vice President: that electoral college consists of the elected and
gl nominated members of both Houses of Parliament — nominated members are
Compare
a
included, and MLAs are not. That fits the office: the Vice President is the chairperson
m a s
.co agl
of the Rajya Sabha, so the electorate is Parliament itself rather than Parliament plus
the states.
se m
g l a
a

co m
Questions and activities — Page 138
m .
m as e
.co
End of chapter
a g l
a s em
agl Q1 Why is universal adult franchise important for a healthy democracy?
se m
com g l a
m . a
ase
agl
Because it is the only arrangement under which a government can honestly claim to
speak for the whole people — and the only one under which it can be removed by them.
The chapter calls it “a cornerstone of Indian democracy”. Here are the reasons, each with the

co m
.
evidence the chapter gives.

se m
m l a
1. It makes citizens politically equal. Every adult gets one vote and all votes have equal value,
o agor income. Outside the polling
.cirrespective of caste, creed, race, religion, gender, education
se m booth people differ enormously in wealth and power; inside it they do not. That single day of
g l a
a equality is what gives the poorest citizen leverage over the most powerful.
c
m .
2. It makes representatives answerable. As the mindmap on page 120 puts it, elected
a s e
. c om
representatives are answerable to the electorate — and the outer bubble says how: “People
agl
vote them out in elections.” Am
a s e representative who can lose office must keep listening.

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Class 8 Social Science Chapter 5 Universal Franchise and India’s Electoral System AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

3. No group can be safely ignored. If every adult votes, a party that neglects the poor, women,
or a small community loses those votes. Universal franchise puts every community inside the
political calculation.
4. It gives people power over their own future. People decide what type of future they want
and who can best represent them, and they participate in solving problems in their area.
5. It creates legitimacy and peace. A government chosen by all adults is accepted even by
those who voted against it — so power changes hands by counting instead of by force.
6. It is a school of citizenship. Voting fosters civic engagement: to vote sensibly a person must
find out what is happening and what candidates propose.

Why the alternative fails: in 1947 some argued for giving the vote only to literate
people, when literacy was about 14 per cent overall and 8 per cent among women.
Such a rule would have left the vast majority — including almost all women —
voiceless, and would have handed power to a small privileged group. Before
Independence only about 13 per cent of Indians could vote, and that arrangement
served the colonial state, not the Indian people. The Constitution makers rejected it
because a democracy in which most adults cannot vote is not a democracy at all.

Did you know? Universal adult franchise reaches all the way down. India has 3.1
million elected representatives — 1.3 million of them women — in more than
250,000 local government bodies, and all of them are elected on this same principle.

Q2 What is the meaning of ‘secret ballot’? Why is this important in a democracy?

A secret ballot means a vote cast in such a way that no one can find out how any
particular voter voted. The chapter’s own definition comes from the Suryodaya School caselet:
Ms. Usha explained the rules “ensuring everyone understood how the secret ballot voting
process would work; no one would know who voted for whom, ensuring the process was private
and fair.”
How secrecy is actually achieved in an Indian election:

The voter enters a screened voting compartment alone.
The EVM records only the total number of votes for each candidate — never which voter
pressed which button.
The VVPAT slip is shown to the voter through a window and then falls into a sealed box; it is
not carried out of the booth.
Ballots or machines are sealed until counting, exactly as Ms. Usha sealed the box in the
classroom.

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Why it is important — four consequences, not one:

WHAT SECRECY WHAT WOULD HAPPEN WITHOUT IT
PREVENTS

Coercion An employer, landlord or local strongman could threaten voters and then verify who
obeyed

Vote-buying A candidate could pay for votes and confirm delivery. A bought vote that cannot be
checked is a bad investment — secrecy is what makes it unverifiable

Revenge after the result Winners could identify and punish those who voted against them; losers’ supporters
would live in fear

Social pressure People would vote as their caste group, employer or family expected rather than as
they judged best

Why it makes the vote equal, not just private: universal franchise gives every
adult one vote of equal value. But a vote given under threat or for payment is not
really the voter’s own — its value has been transferred to whoever applied the
pressure. Secrecy is what protects the equality that Article 326 promises. This is why
secrecy and openness sit together: the choice is secret, while the process — rules,
counting, results — is entirely public.

Q3 Give examples of direct and indirect elections.

In a direct election the people themselves choose the office-holder; in an indirect election
the people choose representatives, and those representatives then choose the office-
holder. The chapter gives clear examples of both.

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Class 8 Social Science Chapter 5 Universal Franchise and India’s Electoral System AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

DIRECT ELECTIONS INDIRECT ELECTIONS

Who votes Every registered adult citizen of the Only a defined set of elected representatives
constituency

Examples from Lok Sabha — 543 constituencies, MPs Rajya Sabha — 233 of the 245 members elected
the chapter elected by the voters by the elected MLAs of the state assemblies (12
State and UT legislative assemblies — are nominated by the President)
MLAs elected by the voters President of India — elected by an electoral
Gram panchayats and urban local college of MPs of both Houses plus MLAs of
bodies — read about in Grade 6; managed the states and of Delhi and Puducherry
by the State Election Commissions Vice President of India — elected by an
electoral college of the elected and nominated
members of both Houses of Parliament

Voting method One person, one vote; ‘First-Past-the-Post’ The single transferable vote system — voters
— the candidate with the most votes wins rank candidates by preference

The chapter’s The whole class elects the Class If a special school-level council were elected by
school Representative the class representatives, that would be an
example indirect election

Why India uses both: direct election gives a body the authority of the people
themselves, which is why the Lok Sabha — from which the government is formed —
is directly elected. Indirect election lets a body represent something other than raw
population. The Rajya Sabha is the Council of States: it is elected by state legislatures
so that the states are represented in Parliament, and the single transferable vote is
used to ensure that smaller states also get fair representation. The President, who
must stand for the whole Union, is chosen by both Parliament and the state
assemblies together.

Careful: ‘indirect’ does not mean ‘undemocratic’. The voters elect the MLAs; the
MLAs elect the Rajya Sabha members and help elect the President. The chain of
consent is longer, but it still starts with the voter.

Q4 How is the election of members to the Lok Sabha different from that to the Rajya
Sabha?

The difference is not in the title — members of both are called MPs — but in who elects
them, how the vote is counted, and how long the house lasts.

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Class 8 Social Science Chapter 5 Universal Franchise and India’s Electoral System AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

LOK SABHA RAJYA SABHA

Type of Direct — by the people Indirect — by elected representatives
election

Who votes Every registered adult citizen, aged 18 The elected members of the state legislative
and above, in the constituency assemblies (MLAs)

Strength 543 constituencies 245 members — 233 elected by MLAs and 12
nominated by the President of India

Method of ‘First-Past-the-Post’ — the candidate Single transferable vote system — MLAs rank
counting with the most votes in a constituency candidates by preference
wins, even without 50 per cent

How seats are One seat per constituency; 84 reserved Each state is allotted a number of seats based on
shared out for scheduled castes and 47 for population — Uttar Pradesh has more than
scheduled tribes Arunachal Pradesh

Life of the Elected as a whole and can be dissolved The Permanent House — never dissolved. A
house member serves six years; one-third retire every
two years and new members are elected

What it The people directly; the government is The states — it is the Council of States
represents formed from its majority

Why the design differs: the two houses are meant to do different jobs. The Lok
Sabha must reflect the current will of the people, so it is elected directly and in full,
and the party or coalition with a majority in it forms the government. The Rajya
Sabha must represent the states and provide continuity — because only a third of it
changes every two years, it is never swept away all at once, and Parliament always
contains members with experience of the previous period. The single transferable
vote is what allows smaller states, and smaller groups within an assembly, to win
seats rather than being shut out entirely by the largest party.

Note: you will learn the exact working of the single transferable vote in higher
classes. For now it is enough to know what it achieves — representation in
proportion to preferences, rather than winner-takes-all.

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co m
m.
What, in your view, are the advantages of the EVM over paper ballots?
e
Q5

m l as
.co a g
a s em
a
Theglmain advantages are speed and accuracy in counting, the near-elimination of invalid
votes, and — with the VVPAT — a paper record that can still be checked. Compare the two

co m
ag
directly.

m .
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PAPER BALLOT
a g l EVM WITH VVPAT

Casting the Mark an ‘X’ against a name, fold the Press one button; a beep confirms the vote was

co m
m.
vote paper, drop it in the box recorded, and the printed slip appears in the VVPAT

m l a se
.co in the wrong place, or two marks make one button press, so ag
Invalid votes Common — an unmarked paper, a mark Almost impossible — the machine accepts exactly

m a vote is either cast or not cast
l a se
g
the vote invalid. In the class election of

a 33 votes, unmarked papers had to be
rejected

m a s
Counting
m
Every paper is sorted and counted by
.co Totals are displayed by the machine; results for a
agl
human error creeps inla
se
hand; results take a long time and whole constituency can be known within hours

ag
m
Cost and Millions of printed papers, ballot boxes, Machines are reused across elections; far less paper
materials
. co
m
storage — and a great deal of paper

m as e
.co
Security Boxes can be stuffed with extra papers
a g l
The machine records votes at a limited rate and can

a s em or snatched be sealed and stored; totals cannot be changed by

agl adding papers

Verification The papers themselves are the record The VVPAT produces a physical paper record so
se m
com g l a
. a
voters can verify that their electronic votes were cast

m
ase
correctly, and it provides a backup for verification

agl
and recounting in case of disputes or failures of the
electronic system

co m
Why the VVPAT matters to the argument: the strongest objection to any electronic
m .
o m l a se
.canswers that objection without giving up the machine’sagadvantages — the voter sees
system is that the voter has to trust a machine she cannot inspect. The VVPAT

se m
g l a
a
a printed slip confirming her choice, and that slip stays in a sealed box as evidence
that can be counted again. So the EVM–VVPAT combination keeps the speed and
.c
s e m
m a
agl
accuracy of electronics and the checkability of paper.
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Did you know? India’s EVMs and VVPATs have been used in countries such as
Namibia and Bhutan with support from the ECI, and other countries have studied
the technology and received training from India in order to adopt it.

Q6 Voter turnout has been declining in some urban areas of India. What could be the
reasons for this trend, and what steps can be taken to encourage more people to
vote?

The chapter names the condition — “voter apathy, particularly in urban areas” — and lists
it among the challenges facing Indian democracy. About 34 per cent of eligible voters did
not vote in 2024. Urban turnout being lower than rural turnout is a well-noticed pattern, and
the reasons fall into four groups.

REASON WHY IT BITES HARDER IN STEP THAT WOULD HELP
CITIES

Apathy — “my An urban constituency has a very Awareness campaigns showing seats decided by
vote won’t large electorate, so one vote feels tiny margins; school and college voter-
matter” smaller. Many city dwellers feel education drives; media and civil society
distant from the winning candidate explaining what an MP or corporator actually
decides

Migration and People move to cities for work but Easy transfer of registration to a new address;
mobility stay registered in their home village or door-to-door enrolment drives in new colonies
in a previous city, and cannot travel
back on polling day

Voter-list Frequent shifting between rented flats Online checking and correction of the roll; a
problems means names go missing or appear in verification camp in every locality before the
the wrong ward election is announced

Polling day A weekday holiday is used for travel Employers required to give paid leave and to
treated as a or leisure; some voters simply do not record it; making the holiday conditional on
holiday bother to return voting is not possible, so persuasion has to do
the work

Dissatisfaction Voters who dislike every candidate Explaining NOTA — it does not change the
with the choices stay home instead of registering the result, but it records that voters want better
objection choices

What has already been tried, from the chapter itself: home voting for the elderly and people
with disabilities (from 2024), postal voting for specified categories, braille voter cards, app-
based requests for wheelchairs and ramps, and officials travelling to remote locations — even to

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Class 8 Social Science Chapter 5 Universal Franchise and India’s Electoral System AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

a polling station for a single voter. These show the ECI’s approach: remove the obstacle rather
than blame the voter.

Why declining urban turnout is a real problem, not just an untidy statistic: if
one group votes far less than another, legislatures hear less from that group, and
policy quietly tilts towards those who do turn out. And an elected member who wins
on a low turnout represents a smaller slice of the electorate, which weakens the
answerability the mindmap on page 120 describes. As the chapter concludes, “An
aware and vigilant voter is the strongest safeguard of a democratic system.”

Q7 Why do you think a proportion of seats in the Lok Sabha is reserved for scheduled
castes and scheduled tribes? Write a short note.

Reservation of seats exists to make sure that communities historically kept out of power
are actually present in the legislature — not merely allowed to vote in it. The chapter gives
the numbers: of the 543 Lok Sabha constituencies, 84 are reserved for persons from the
scheduled castes and 47 for scheduled tribes, leaving 412 general seats.

412 general + 84 SC + 47 ST = 543 Lok Sabha constituencies

Reserved seats = 84 + 47 = 131, about 24 per cent of the house

84 seats — SC

47 seats — ST

412 seats — general

412 Total 543
general

How the 543 Lok Sabha seats are divided, as shown in the pie chart on page 129.

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Class 8 Social Science Chapter 5 Universal Franchise and India’s Electoral System AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

The reasons, set out as a short note:

1. Voting alone does not guarantee representation. Under First-Past-the-Post, the candidate
with the most votes in a constituency wins. If members of a community are a minority
almost everywhere, they can vote in every election and still elect almost no one from among
themselves. Reserving certain constituencies makes sure that in those seats the winner must
come from that community.
2. These communities faced long-standing exclusion. The scheduled castes and scheduled
tribes were denied education, land, temple entry and public office for generations. Equality
on paper could not undo that quickly; a guaranteed place in the law-making body could give
them a voice while it was being undone.
3. Laws are better when the people affected help make them. Questions about tribal land,
forest rights, discrimination and access to education are best raised by members who have
lived those conditions, not only described by others.
4. It strengthens democracy rather than weakening it. Note carefully: in a reserved
constituency every voter still votes — the seat is reserved for candidates from that
community, not the vote. So no voter loses a right; the house simply becomes more like the
country it governs.

Why it is placed in this chapter: the chapter’s argument is that universal franchise
means nothing unless people can really use it. Accessibility measures make sure a
disabled or elderly voter can cast a vote; reserved seats make sure historically
excluded communities can actually be heard in the house that results. Both are
answers to the same question: how do you turn a formal right into a real one?

Q8 Social media is changing the way we experience elections — from catchy campaign
reels and live speeches to political debates on Instagram and Twitter. But is this
strengthening democracy or confusing it? Discuss in pairs: What are the benefits,
what are the challenges, and what might the future of elections be in a digital age?

The honest answer is that social media does both, and which one dominates depends on
how voters use it. Here is the material for the paired discussion — benefits, challenges, and the
future — with the chapter’s own test to judge it by.

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BENEFITS — HOW IT CHALLENGES — HOW IT CAN CONFUSE
STRENGTHENS DEMOCRACY

Direct access. A voter can hear a candidate’s False information spreads fast. A doctored clip or an invented
own words in a live speech, without waiting claim can reach millions before it is corrected — and corrections
for a newspaper report travel far more slowly than the original

Low cost of speaking. A candidate without Money returns in a new form. Paid advertising, promoted posts
money for hoardings, and an ordinary citizen and armies of accounts can drown out the unfunded voice — which
with a question, can both be heard connects to the chapter’s worry about the growing influence of
money in elections

Two-way conversation. Voters can question Abuse and hostility. The chapter shows abusive language by a
candidates publicly and see whether they candidate (Fig. 5.18) as a code-of-conduct violation; online, such
answer language spreads further and faster

Reaching the young. Many first-time voters Echo chambers. Feeds show you more of what you already agree
get their news here; the ECI itself uses these with, so voters can stop meeting the other side’s arguments at all
platforms for voter awareness

Accountability in public. A promise recorded Style over substance. A 20-second reel rewards a memorable line
in a reel can be replayed five years later rather than a workable plan

What the future might look like: more campaigning online than on the street; election
commissions monitoring digital campaign spending and paid political advertising as carefully as
they monitor posters and rallies; faster verification tools and clear labelling of manipulated
media; and — as artificial intelligence makes convincing fake video easier — a much greater
need for voters who check a claim before sharing it. The Model Code of Conduct will have to be
applied to online conduct as fully as it is applied on the ground.

The test to judge any of this by: the chapter says the way forward “lies in
empowering voters with the information they need to make thoughtful and
responsible choices”, and that media, education and awareness campaigns must
work together to help people, especially the youth, understand the importance of
voting wisely. So ask of any digital development: does it help a voter judge better,
or does it only help someone else persuade faster? Social media that informs
strengthens democracy; social media that only excites, misleads or divides does not.

Tip for the pair discussion: take one recent claim you saw online about any public
matter, and try to trace it to its original source. Whether or not you succeed, that
exercise is itself the answer to the question — an aware and vigilant voter is the
strongest safeguard of a democratic system.

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co m
m.
Visit the website ______ and choose a parliamentary constituency election from any
e
Q9

m l as
.co
year and explore its results. Do the same for an assembly election in your state.

a g
se m
g l a
a

Note first that the printed book leaves the web address blank in this question — the space

m
where the website name should appear is empty in both the English and the Hindi editions. The
. co ag
m
site meant is the Election Commission of India’s official election results portal, reachable

l a se
from the ECI’s own website, eci.gov.in, which publishes the result of every parliamentary and
assembly constituency going back a g decades. Ask your teacher to confirm the current
many
address before you begin.

co m
m.
Method — do it in this order:

o m l a se
c result and copy out: the winning candidate and party, theagrunner-up, the votes each
1. Choose a year and a parliamentary constituency — your own is the most interesting.
2. Open .its
se m
g l areceived, the total valid votes polled, the NOTA count, and the turnout percentage.
a 3. Repeat for an assembly constituency in your own state, ideally one that lies inside the same
parliamentary constituency.
m a s
m .co
4. Compare the two and write four or five sentences on what you noticed.
agl
l a se
a g
What to look for — this is what turns copying numbers into an answer:

om
QUESTION TO ASK OF THE DATA WHAT IT TEACHES YOU

Often not — this is ‘First-Past-the-Post’ inm
. c
m
Did the winner get more than 50 per cent of
example is Gurmat winning with 12lof s e
a33 votes
action. The chapter’s own

. co
the votes?
ag
m
seWhat was the victory margin?
l a
ag
Some seats are decided by a few hundred votes. This is the clearest
possible answer to “my one vote won’t matter”

se m
com g l a
.so roughly 34 per cent did not a
What was the turnout? Compare with the national figure — about 66 per cent voted in 2024,

m
ase
How many NOTA votes? agl It does not change the result, but it records dissatisfaction with all
the candidates

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e
Is the seat marked SC or ST? 84 Lok Sabha seats are reserved for scheduled castes and 47 for

m l as
.co g
scheduled tribes

em Did the same party win both the a
a s
gl
Frequently not — voters do distinguish between national and state

a parliamentary and the assembly seat? issues
c
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Sample write-up (replace with your own real figures): “In our parliamentary
constituency the winner polled about 41 per cent of the valid votes, so nearly three
out of five voters had chosen someone else — yet under First-Past-the-Post that was
enough to win. Turnout was about 63 per cent, a little below the national average. In
the assembly constituency inside it, a different party won, and the margin was under
4,000 votes.”

Why this activity closes the chapter: everything you have read — universal
franchise, the ECI, FPTP, NOTA, reserved seats, turnout — appears together on a
single result page. Reading one such page carefully is the quickest way to see that
the ‘electoral system’ is not an abstract idea but a set of numbers about your own
neighbourhood.

Chapter at a glance
Universal adult franchise means one adult, one vote, and every vote of equal value.
Every Indian citizen aged 18 and above may vote — irrespective of caste, creed, race,
religion, gender, education or income. That is what the word ‘universal’ carries. It rests on
Article 326 of the Constitution and applies to the Lok Sabha, to every state and union
territory assembly, and to all local elections in villages and cities. No one may vote on
another’s behalf, and a person convicted of certain serious crimes is barred from voting.
The Constitution makers took this decision at the outset, and it was a bold one. In
1947 India’s literacy rate was about 14 per cent — only about 8 per cent among women —
and some argued the vote should go only to literate people. Before Independence roughly
13 per cent of Indians could vote. India nevertheless gave women the vote from the very
beginning, ahead of many countries: Swiss women got it only in 1971. Alladi Krishnaswami
Ayyar’s words open the chapter: “never before in the history of the world has such an
experiment been so boldly undertaken.”
The scale is the reason the machinery has to be so elaborate. In the 2024 general
election about 968 million voters were eligible across 543 parliamentary constituencies,
with over 1 million polling stations. India’s eligible-voter population is fifteen times that of
the United Kingdom, and India is six times larger than France in area. Beyond that, 3.1
million elected representatives (1.3 million of them women) sit in more than 250,000 local
government bodies — all chosen by universal adult franchise.
The Election Commission of India is an independent constitutional body, set up in
1950. It conducts elections to the Lok Sabha, the Rajya Sabha, the state legislative
assemblies and the offices of the President and Vice President; the first general elections
were held in 1951–1952. It sets election dates, registers political parties, enforces the Model
Code of Conduct and oversees the whole electoral process. Its structure runs from the Chief

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Election Commissioner and two Election Commissioners at the national level, to the Chief
Electoral Officer in each state/UT, to the District Election Officer, and below him the
Returning Officer (conducts elections) and the Electoral Registration Officer (manages
the voter list). Local body elections are run by the State Election Commissions.
India uses ‘First-Past-the-Post’ for the Lok Sabha and the assemblies. The candidate
with the most votes in a constituency wins, even without 50 per cent of the votes — exactly
as Gurmat won the class election with 12 of 33 votes. Members elected to the Lok Sabha are
MPs, those elected to state assemblies are MLAs. 84 Lok Sabha seats are reserved for the
scheduled castes and 47 for the scheduled tribes, leaving 412 general seats. The party or
coalition with a majority forms the government, and its leader becomes prime minister (or
chief minister in a state).
Not every election is direct. Of the Rajya Sabha’s 245 members, 233 are elected by the
elected MLAs of the state assemblies and 12 are nominated by the President; it is a
permanent house that is never dissolved, a member serves six years, and one-third retire
every two years. The President is chosen by an electoral college of MPs of both Houses
plus MLAs of the states and of Delhi and Puducherry; the Vice President by an electoral
college of the elected and nominated members of both Houses. All three use the single
transferable vote system.
Safeguards, and the challenges that remain. The secret ballot, the indelible ink, the
NOTA option, the EVM with its VVPAT paper slip, and the Model Code of Conduct (adopted
in Kerala in 1960, circulated by the ECI in 1962, actively enforced from 1991) all exist to keep
elections free and fair; T.N. Seshan, CEC from 1990, added voter IDs and strict checks on
campaign spending. Even so the chapter names three live problems — the growing
influence of money, a significant proportion of candidates with criminal records, and
voter apathy, particularly in urban areas. About 34 per cent of eligible voters did not vote
in 2024. The chapter’s answer is an informed and vigilant voter.

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Quick revision

TERM WHAT IT MEANS WHERE IT WHAT THE BOOK SAYS
APPEARS IN THE ABOUT IT
CHAPTER

Franchise A right granted by the Margin note, page ‘Suffrage’ is a synonym of
constitution or government 118 franchise

Universal adult Every adult citizen gets one ‘Universal Adult Age 18 and above, irrespective
franchise vote, and all votes have equal Franchise’, page 118 of caste, creed, race, religion,
value gender, education, income;
Article 326

Constituency An area whose voters elect a Margin note, page 543 constituencies for the Lok
representative to a legislative 119 Sabha; a Lok Sabha
body constituency may contain two
or more assembly
constituencies

System A group of interconnected or Margin note, page Used to explain what an
interdependent elements that 119 ‘electoral system’ is
work together to achieve a
common purpose or function

Election The independent constitutional ‘Election Commission Established 1950; conducts Lok
Commission of body responsible for conducting of India — A brief Sabha, Rajya Sabha, state
India (ECI) free and fair elections introduction’, page assembly, President and Vice
126 President elections

Secret ballot A vote cast so that no one knows The Suryodaya Ms. Usha explained the rules
who voted for whom School caselet, page “ensuring the process was
124 private and fair”

NOTA ‘None Of The Above’ — the DON’T MISS OUT, It doesn’t change the result but
option to reject all candidates page 125 sends a message — voters
want better choices

EVM Electronic voting machine; the Fig. 5.13, page 129; Used with ECI support in
voter presses a button and hears Fig. 5.16, page 130 Namibia and Bhutan; other
a beep countries have received training
from India

VVPAT Voter Verifiable Paper Audit LET’S EXPLORE, page A backup for verification and
Trail — a printed slip that lets 130 recounting in case of disputes
the voter verify the vote was or failures of the electronic
cast correctly system

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TERM WHAT IT MEANS WHERE IT WHAT THE BOOK SAYS
APPEARS IN THE ABOUT IT
CHAPTER

Model Code of The dos and don’ts for leaders, ‘Model Code of Adopted in Kerala 1960;
Conduct (MCC) parties and candidates during an Conduct (MCC)’, page circulated by the ECI in 1962;
election 130 the ECI proactive from 1991

First-Past-the- The candidate receiving the Page 132–133 A candidate can win without
Post most votes in a constituency securing even 50 per cent of
wins the total votes

Coalition A group of two or more parties Margin note, page A party or coalition with a
working together 133 majority in the Lok Sabha forms
the national government

Indirect election Voters elect representatives, who ‘Election to the Rajya 233 of the 245 Rajya Sabha
in turn elect someone else Sabha’, page 134 members are elected by MLAs;
12 are nominated by the
President

Single A special voting method in Pages 134–137 Used for the Rajya Sabha, the
transferable which voters rank candidates by President and the Vice
vote preference President; ensures smaller
states get fair representation

Dissolution Expiry or termination due to the Margin note, page The Rajya Sabha is the
end of its term or other 134 Permanent House — it is never
Constitutional reason dissolved

Bicameral A system where the legislative Margin note, page Members of Legislative
legislature body is divided into two 136 Councils in such states do not
separate chambers or houses vote in the presidential election

Electoral college The specific group of elected ‘Election of the MPs of both Houses + MLAs of
representatives who vote in an President of India’, the states and of Delhi and
indirect election page 136 Puducherry

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