The Orchestra at the recent National Convention of Bahai’s of India (2010).

More often than not, we see that the National Convention of every country is an orchestra in which the members to be elected are predecided. The recently concluded elections to the NSA of India are a further proof to this principle.

So what exactly happened in this election? Eight members of the previous assembly were reelected. For the ninth member, it was declared a tie amongst Mr. Sohail Mohajir, Mr. Sunil Oliyai and Mrs. Shireen Malahati. It is no coincidence, but selectively all are of Persian background. The delegates were then asked to break the tie and elect the ninth member from these three members only. Finally, as reported, Mrs. Shireen Malahati was elected.

The process by itself was not conducted in a transparent manner and in a fashion befitting a democratic process of election. There was no disclosure of how many votes each members received. How many votes did the 9th member receive? And by how many votes was the tie was broken? This is a complete violation of a democratic election, in which as claimed by the Baha'is, the number of votes polled by each member should be declared too.

By conducting this orchestra the Universal House of Justice has clearly tried to convey to the Baha'is that “The elections are true elections because a member like Mr. Sohail Mohajir who is related to UHJ member, Mr. Payman Mohajir can not be re- elected”. Interestingly last year too, Mr. Sohail Mohajir was not elected and Mr. Ahmed Ansari was made the sacrificial lamb and asked to resign to make a way for Mr. Sohail. Let us see what is the policy of UHJ this year.

The process seems to be one of selection and not election because for the ninth member all the three members were Persians. The two were first timers. In this way, the UHJ has given the indication that who are the tenth and the eleventh member in the waiting list. An indication to the delegates that if any of these nine members fall away from the grace of UHJ then whom they should vote for.

A new policy of UHJ, “preparation of pool of names” a hidden way of nomination of candidates.

The UHJ, through the counselor present in the national convention, has instructed delegates to prepare a pool of names to whom they can vote. These pure souls are then asked to write the names of about 20 to 25 members for whom they have to vote. During this so called spiritual atmosphere the incumbent members keep on moving in front of the delegates to remind them lest they forget. So it does not take much effort to understand the preparation of pool of names is nomination of candidates.

All the NSA members were present during the preparation of pool of names and during the deepening sessions, the delegates commented upon the behavior of the outgoing members but with no result.

It is very true that there are some Baha'is who never worked and will never work for the Faith. What they want is let others work. They can only order for work and be in the position of authority. One cannot go against the prescribe norms because this is what the UHJ wants.

A delegate at the National Convention India (2010)