The Democracy we Deserve

In the packed air of the SAC conference room, a faint creak cuts through the murmurs of students gathered at the venue as the General Secretary of Hostel Affairs rises from his seat. He arranges a stack of papers, clears his throat, and begins to speak, with his voice carrying the weight of hundreds of students behind him. The report he presents: a compilation of a campus-wide survey on the recent security reforms, summarises the discomfort, logistics and real experiences of students.

A hand is raised from across the room. The Postgraduate Nominee chimes in with a different perspective. Then another hand goes up. Some representatives voice their support, while others offer their feedback. The first question births a rebuttal, the rebuttal sparks a debate, and the discussion gradually opens up, absorbing perspectives shaped by varying departments, hostels, and routines.

In one corner, a student types steadily, documenting the exchange as it unfolds around them. By the end of the hour, fatigue looms across the hall, but so does conviction. The Dean of Student Affairs finally leans forward as he acknowledges the students’ concerns. He promises that the policies will be revisited. There is a brief pause as the meaning sinks in, followed by a soft rise of applause as the meeting reaches a close. As chairs scrape back, students resume their conversations in clusters, tired yet optimistic. Student governance, for once, feels real.

Above is only an idealised scene of self-governance by students when it works. What follows at IIT Bombay, however, is far from this imagined reality.

For a polity that wishes to govern itself, a Constitution serves as the framework, the very skeleton around which the system wishes to operate. A Constitution is more than just a rulebook; it is a social contract which establishes the people as the collective authority. The Sovereign, i.e the people,  govern through this general will. However, the mere existence of a Constitution does not guarantee that the rules are a reflection of the general will. At IITB, sovereignty — the expression of the students’ collective will — only exists in name and rulebooks today

The SAC Constitution was intended to transform the student collective into a body capable of acting self-sufficiently; to reflect our collective will.  However, this system is only as strong as the citizens who practice it; if they become passive, our student body opens itself up to subversion by self-interested parties and the beginning of officialdom. 

Amid this widening gap between aspiration and reality, Insight attempts to examine the failure of student governance at IIT Bombay.  This article is written in the hope that Insight may function, in the words of Dani Rodrik, as “a participatory political institution to elicit local knowledge and help build better institutions.”

Today, IIT Bombay suffers from constitutional nominalism, where a document exists and is quoted, but fails to guide the behaviour of student representatives in accordance with the general will of the people it represents. It has fundamentally become a document of convenience rather than compliance.

While the lack of conformity to the Constitution for nominating awardees does not meaningfully constitute a loss of general will, the above exchange elucidates the phenomenon of constitutional nominalism.  Establishing the reasons behind the obscurity of the SAC Constitution is not an easy undertaking. However, an attempt is warranted to propose remedies and solutions.

The Hollow Mandate

Basic duties of the GSAA (UG):

• He/She shall supervise the working of the UGAC, Career Cell and Society for Promotion of Undergraduate Research.
• He/She shall act as a student representative in all matters relating to undergraduate academic affairs of the institute. These include, but are not limited to the academic programme, the curriculum, the academic office and administration, technical activities and undergraduate research.
• He/She shall chair the UG Department General Secretaries Committee (DGSC) and will convene it at least once a month. Along with the GSAA (PG), GSAA (UG) shall chair the Joint Department General Secretaries Committee (DGSC) and will convene it at least once a semester.
• He/She shall be a member of the Undergraduate Programme Committee (UGPC).
• He/She shall be a member of the Library Committee.
• He/She shall strive to increase awareness among the student community on academic issues and to redress their queries and grievances.

Basic Duties of the GSAA(UG) as defined in the SAC Constitution

Our constitutional structure is rooted in procedural minimalism instead of substantive content. With procedural aspects insufficiently specified, the true authority and spirit of these positions risk being reduced to internal intent. A glance at the GSAA (UG)’s specified duties provides a telling example. We can see that these duties are largely positional, i.e., membership in committees, rather than specifying the position’s jurisdiction. These duties (which extensively use the word ‘shall ’) keep the language aspirational, rather than underscoring specific responsibilities. While this may not seem like a problem, it leads to a situation wherein just the existence of the office equates to compliance with constitutional duties. This is not limited merely to the GSAA but extends to all elected positions it seeks to guide. 

This ambiguity manifests in practice in three ways: first, representatives refrain from intervening due to uncertainty about their role.  Second, it remains unclear which authority is empowered to take a final decision. Lastly, the coexistence of the first two lends plausible deniability to the elected representatives, regarding both their intervention and the final outcome. This leads to institutional inaction, blurred lines of responsibility and habitual redirections, typical of babus in government offices.

The ultimate result is a permanent negotiability of the outcome of their tenure. A structure that permits adherence to the textual formalism, instead of the spirit the role is meant to embody, loses any legitimacy granted by the will of the people. Accountability thus becomes dependent on goodwill and personal effort, rather than an obligation.

Accountability in Abeyance

15 GENERAL BODY MEETING (GBM)

15.1 The President chairs the General Body. The Chairman (Sports/Cultural/Technical) or the concerned Faculty-In-Charge and all the members of the concerned council are members of the General Body. The concerned council student head shall be Vice-Chairman of the GBM.
The President in consultation with the respective head of council will appoint an Institute General Secretary as the Moderator for the GBM. The General Body aims at reviewing the performance of the Office Bearers.

GBMs as defined in the SAC Constitution

A Constitution which fails to evolve with time ceases to express the general will of the people. If governing institutions ossify while social conditions transform, constitutional order may no longer have the weight of the will of the people, even if it continues to function formally. Nothing expresses this as starkly as General Body Meetings (GBMs). 

The current structure is procedurally cumbersome, requiring the presentation of work reports, the initiation of impeachment by another General Secretary, and the presence of Dean SA at all GBMs. These provisions may have been achievable at the time the SAC constitution was amended; however, in the current state of the institute, they act as a barrier to enforcing accountability. In doing so, it impedes the authority of the people to withdraw their confidence in elected representatives.

The impeachment process, while being procedurally rigorous, underscores its very limitations. The current system requires a formal motion, a debate in a General Body Meeting, the right of defence, sufficient quorum, the presence of the Dean SA and removal through a two-thirds majority via secret ballot. In practice, it remains largely defunct and structurally disincentivised from use. When such a removal process exists only under ideal conditions, it remains an illusion to the general student.

The Constitution also fails to clarify how roles and powers within a student body would shift in an impeachment-resignation scenario, making removal an undesirable outcome and something practically unviable for all parties involved. An example of this is the 2023 resignation of the GSSA. The official process in the Constitution calls for a by-election; however, with Inter-IIT Sports being organised in IIT Bombay, a GSSA was nominated instead, with the old one still shouldering substantial responsibilities. The Constitutional institutions, therefore, tend to tolerate suboptimal performance rather than risk the absence of any office-bearer altogether, further highlighting the impracticality of the provisions.  Such stopgap solutions, however,  not only subordinate the will of the people to an administrative convenience but also open the floodgates to future noncompliance.

It is because these solutions have become the norm, and because there is an administrative preference against impeachment in the middle of a tenure, that multiple General Secretaries informally convey the futility of GBMs. An illustration of this effect is the callousness of the reply from a General Secretary when questioned about the lapses in the conduct of  GBMs,
“Why should the Constitution, made years ago, define how we function? People can always come to us to resolve their queries.”

GBMs also provide an example of a Montesquieuian design flaw, i.e emerging from the failure of the separation of powers – here, the individual powers of governance and accountability.  The current structure places the responsibility for convening the GBM on the very office-bearers whose performance is meant to be assessed. A General Secretary is responsible for initiating the meeting, ensuring a quorum, and conducting it once per semester. This creates an inherent conflict of interest, allowing the provision to be repeatedly deferred. Today, this is often justified by logistical constraints such as placement timelines or the difficulty of aligning schedules across General Secretaries.

For a Constitution that binds

To ensure adequate separation of powers and accountability of elected representatives, Constitutions embed adversarial enforcement responsibilities in other branches of government (such as the judiciary and the parliament). Formally, the responsibility of constitutional oversight lies with the Dean of Student Affairs, who acts as the Chair of the SAC. In practice, however, the Dean’s office shoulders responsibilities far greater than policing the day-to-day deviations from the Constitution.

 As a result, this intervention occurs only in cases of gross violations. Furthermore, reporting obligations exist towards institutional authorities, but there is a glaring absence of regular disclosure, public reviews, and performance reporting directed towards the very people who elect them.

What emerges, then, is a conjuncture of opacity in decision-making and a void in the enforcement of the Constitution. The absence of a parliament and an enforcer undermines the most basic tenets of a Constitution, the separation of powers. The parliament, which has the authority to ask regular questions, and the enforcer, who ensures adherence to the Constitution. Only in such a system can accountability be ensured beyond mere moral trust.

The contributing author is a former SMP Overall Coordinator and Institute Senate Student Representative.