Ranchi, December 17: As many as 64 candidates, out of 164 candidates, i.e 39 per cent contesting in the fifth phase of Assembly polls in Jharkhand, for which elections will be held on December 18, are having self-declared criminal charges. They constitute 39 per cent of total candidates.
This was revealed by the Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR) and National Election Watch (NEW), a nationwide campaign comprising of more than 1,200 NGOs and other citizen groups, who are working on electoral reforms and improving democracy and governance in India.
NEW has analysed 164 affidavits of candidates contesting for 16 seats of fifth phase in Jharkhand.
There are 64 candidates (out of 164, i.e. about 39 %) who have pending criminal casesagainst them as per their self attested under oath declarations. Out of these, 36 candidates have got serious cases against them, like that of murder, attempt to murder, kidnapping, extortion, causing hurts by dangerous weapons and dacoity.
Almost all major parties have given tickets to candidates with criminal background. JMM has 8 candidates out of 14 candidates contesting election with pending criminal cases. RJD has 8 candidates out of 12 candidates contesting elections with pending criminal cases. AJSU has 7 candidates out of 11 candidates contesting elections with pending criminal cases followed by INC (7 out of 12) & BSP has 5 candidates out of 15 with pending criminal charges.
RJD has 7 candidates (58%) out of 12 candidates contesting election with serious IPC charges followed by JMM & AJSU has 5 & 3 candidates contesting election with serious IPC charges respectively.
Of 163 candidates contesting elections, 17 candidates have declared that their assets are more than a crore, i.e. about 7% of the contesting candidates are crorepatis. The highest assets declared are 14.13 Crores (approx) by Rameshwar Oraon of INC from Manika Constituency followed by Satyendra Nath Tiwary of JVM(P) from Garwa (5.29 Cr approx).
NEW was able to find that 4 MLAs who are re-contesting in the fifth phase and whose affidavits are available from b oth 2005 and 2009 elections. The average increase in the assets of the MLAs in rupees is around 26 lakh and in percentage 138 per cent.
Several candidates have declared pending liabilities in their affidavits. Pramila Waranwal of AITC from Barkatha has declared Liabilities worth more than 80Lakh.
He is followed by Ramdeo Ganjhu of JMM from Latehar with liabilities of 37 Lakh.
Several candidates have not declared their PAN card details in their affidavits inspite of space for it in their affidavits. A total of 91 (ie.55%) candidates have not declared their PAN details. In addition there are list of candidates who have declared their asset more than 25 Lac but have not declared their PAN card details.
–Agencies