Towards the end of last year, King Jigme Singye Wangchuk, architect of the momentous changes now taking place, voluntarily abdicated and made way for his son, the present king. It was a stunning and unexpected gesture, and it had the desired effect of concentrating his country's attention on the challenge of converting into a full-fledged democracy.

Bhutan has adopted a far-reaching new constitution after painstaking effort to explain it to the people and obtain their assent. There are to be elections to a national assembly that will be the effective source of the state's authority, unlike the present one, whose role is largely advisory. How to elect this assembly and ensure its proper functioning is the present task.

Partly this is a matter of proper organisation. Bhutan has never had the kind of general election that it now faces: earlier assemblies had a representative character no doubt, the members being selected by consensus in their respective areas, but there is a qualitative difference between what was and what is to be. Until now, there has never been the sort of balloting that will be the basis for election to the new assembly. The task of ensuring that all eligible voters are able to cast their votes is not simple: Bhutan's population is not large but it is scattered thinly over a substantial tract of high and steep mountains. Access, security, fairness, observance of proper procedure by a largely unlettered population, all these issues will need to be dealt with in a transparent and judicious manner.

The problems are reminiscent of those that India has faced from the start of its own democracy. However, Bhutan's experiment is on a much more manageable scale, and that country has been able to make a trial run to familiarise its citizens with voting procedures before the real thing happens. Just recently four dummy parties were pitted against each other in a rehearsal for the election next year, which seems to have been a useful exercise. It is also an index of the seriousness with which the matter is being approached. In this, as in all the other preliminaries, the preparations are meticulous.

The obvious ally for Bhutan in this democratic leap forward is India. Excellent relations between the two countries have encouraged Bhutan to draw on India's experience, so that India's Central Election Commission (CEC) has been invited to share its knowledge with its counterpart in Thimphu to devise procedures that best meet the needs of the Bhutanese. To spread the message further, India recently invited groups of journalists and observers from the mountain country to observe the elections in UP for themselves. They were able to see how, despite tough weather conditions, a sprawling constituency and the vast numbers involved, actual polling was orderly and properly managed.

Of course, India is not the only democracy in the world, and Bhutan is attracting more and more attention internationally as it steadily emerges from its chrysalis. There were others who sought to become prime partners in the transition now taking place, with funds and other blandishments on offer. Thus turning to India and its CEC was an act of choice, not a necessity for Bhutan, and should be recognised as such.

Familiarisation with the voting process is the smaller part of what lies ahead. The contest for supremacy must be between political parties and, as yet, few have emerged. Formation of parties is something innovative in a country that has hitherto discouraged any such development. Governmental leaders are all appointed officials; over the years they have become accustomed to the exercise of authority, and several of the present crop of ministers are well qualified to lead in their own right. But mostly they prefer to keep away from the political marketplace, being loath, like Shakespeare's Coriolanus, to garner support by going before the populace to extol their own virtues.

As a result, there is an anxious wait for credible parties to emerge. At least two must be in the lists, to provide government and opposition, and preferably there should be a wider choice. Thus the recent announcement that a third party has now been formed to line up against two that were established earlier is seen as an encouraging development. But these are still rather shadowy, half-formed entities, with an uncertain future role. The expectation must be that as the election draws closer, there will be a stronger urge to participate, and new parties will make a bid for power.

Next year will be a crucial one in Bhutan's history. Three key events will be celebrated: the coronation of the new king, the elections under the new constitution and the centenary of the monarchy. With these, Bhutan will take a major step forward in accepting the challenges of the present era. Already the preparations for all the programmes for the coming year are well under way.

The democratic evolution of Bhutan has been welcomed in India. The tutelary relationship between the two, which was inherited from British days, is long over and has now been formally annulled in last year's treaty that replaces the earlier one of 1949. Yet some adjustments of approach are bound to become necessary. Joint military training and road development is a feature of the bilateral relationship. This entails the maintenance of a modest Indian training contingent in Bhutan and a certain amount of road construction and repair by India's border roads organisation.

The circumstances that necessitated these arrangements have changed, so that they should now be re-examined and scaled down as required. This would be a normal evolution in the relationship, parallel to the revision of the outdated 1949 treaty.

Another set of issues to be handled by the two countries relates to the relative prosperity of Bhutan compared with the contiguous areas of India which remain poorly developed. Sale of electric power to India from hydro-electric projects on its rivers has brought revenue to Bhutan, and this has stimulated development on a considerable scale. Once, people in need of medical attention would go from Bhutan across the open border to India; now, the traffic may well be in the opposite direction.

Salman Haidar

The Statesman

New Delhi

The author is India's former foreign secretary.

The Statesman is a member of the Asia News Network.