Eye-opener for ECI
A recent report published by the Association of Democratic Reforms (ADR), an Election Watch Panel made shocking and interesting findings that every third candidate in the ongoing UP assembly elections is facing a criminal charge, including some for serious crimes like rape, murder and kidnapping, while Crorepatis account for a similar percentage of those in the fray, an analysis of their self-declared affidavits showed today.
The seven-phase elections will end on March 8 while the campaign for the final phase has already entered its last lap. We are appending below the salient features of these horrible findings for the information of our readers
According to an analysis of self-sworn affidavits of total 4,823 candidates in this election (out of 4853 overall in the fray) by the Uttar Pradesh Election Watch and Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR), 859 have disclosed criminal cases against them (18 per cent) and further 704 have serious criminal cases (15 per cent).
ADR said 31 candidates were not analysed due to unclear affidavit available on the ECI website.
It found as many as 1,457 crorepati candidates across the seven phases (30 per cent), while the overall average asset of those in the fray stood at Rs 1.91 crore.
The share of those with criminal cases stood at 19 per cent in the UP assembly polls in 2012, while the number of candidates with serious criminal cases, including cases related to rape, murder, kidnapping, communal disharmony and crime against women, has gone up from 8 per cent in the last elections.
The report at least can be an eye-opener for the Election Commission of India to take effective steps to expedite the much delayed election reforms and seeks and motivate the government to give the poll reforms legislative strength soon.
