In the era of globalisation, political funding turns multi-currency

Elections these days — even assembly ones — are more international than most people suspect. While no one would be surprised to learn that lakhs worth of currency notes are being regularly seized by beady-eyed police forces in poll-bound Bihar, the news that the amounts did not entirely consist of Indian rupees would surely raise a few eyebrows at least. This week, in addition to the usual haul of unaccounted-for rupees, notes of Nepali, Qatari, Saudi, Malay, Bangladeshi and even Indonesian origin have apparently been seized. Nepali and Bangladeshi currency could conceivably have a cachet given that Bihar borders one country and is not too far from the other, but does the presence of money from much farther afield connote the increasingly cosmopolitan aspirations of the average Indian election ‘facilitator’?

During the 2014 general elections too, a similarly diverse basket of foreign currency was seized along with the usual Indian tender from various parts of India, indicating that at least one type of conversion is flourishing in many places without raising any dust. It may be worthwhile to find out what kind of illicit liquor is confiscated during electiontime raids, to ascertain whether this traditional category of blandishment also displays a correspondingly variegated international flavour nowadays.