The most robust part of India's "democracy" is its voting system which is among the most accessible in the world and is likely one of the best in the world.
By all other metrics and measures, India is a feudal state where laws are great on paper but terrible otherwise. People should - rightfully so - be wary of labelling India a democracy.
That's the assessment of an NGO, which may have some merit to it, and maybe not.
To quote the same article,
> Prof Mukherjee says most non-academics would be incredulous that a handful of research assistants and country experts get to decide that a country is an "electoral autocracy" while hundreds of millions of that country's citizens would disagree.
> "So really this is an instance of academic discourse and concepts operating at a considerable distance from lived experience. The operational concepts across the two domains are very different."
but they are elected and can be replaced. You can see people using their rights to replace government (both national and state). Also reduce or increase their mandate over the years.
No country is a true democracy nor just that. Every country claiming democracy it an amalgamation of various ideas mixed in varying percentage.
India is a parliamentary democratic secular republic with socialism also thrown in. Most of these ideas are overlapping but also has slighly differing paths.
It is difficult to even agree on one precise definition on what each of these are without a debate ensuing.