ehradun: A total of 107 candidates accounting for 17% of the total candidates in the fray for the Assembly polls in Uttarakhand scheduled next week have criminal cases against them, including murder, attempt to murder and cases against women.
Voting for all 70 Assembly seats in the state is scheduled for February 14 with counting to be held on March 10. A total of 632 candidates are in the fray in these elections. According to the Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR), of the 626 candidates, whose affidavits for nominations have been analysed so far, 107 (17%) candidates have declared criminal cases against themselves.
This is a considerable dip from the 2017 Uttarakhand Assembly elections wherein 91 (14%) out of 637 candidates had declared criminal cases against themselves. Furthermore, 61 (10%) have declared serious criminal cases against themselves. In the 2017 Uttarakhand Assembly elections, 54 (8%) candidates had declared serious criminal cases against themselves.
As for the party-wise candidates in criminal cases, 23 out of 70 candidates are from Congress (33%), 13 (19%) candidates from BJP, 15 (22%) candidates from Aam Aadmi Party, according to ADR. Ten candidates (19%) candidates from Bahujan Samaj Party and 7 (17%) candidates from UKD have declared criminal cases against themselves in their affidavits.
Party-wise candidates with serious criminal cases: 11 out of 70 candidates are from Congress (16%), 8 out of 70 candidates from BJP (11%), 9 candidates from Aam Aadmi Party (13%), 54 of Bahujan Samaj Party 6 (11%) candidates and 4 (10%) UKD candidates have declared serious criminal cases against themselves in their affidavits.
Six candidates in the fray for the Uttarakhand polls also have declared cases of crimes against women even as one candidate has declared a case related to murder. Besides, three candidates have declared cases related to attempts to murder (IPC Section-307) against themselves. Accordingly, the authorities have declared 13 (19%) out of 70 constituencies as red alert constituencies.
Red alert constituencies are those where three or more contesting candidates have declared criminal cases against themselves. The ADR and Uttarakhand Election Watch, while releasing their report, said that the affidavits of 626 candidates out of 632 have been analyzed wherein 40 percent of the candidates are millionaires out of whom the assets of 252 candidates are more than one crore. The assetsv of six candidates have not been analyzed “because their affidavits were either badly scanned or were not uploaded completely on the website of the Election Commission”.
Out of 626 candidates, 252 (40%) are crorepatis. In the 2017 Uttarakhand Assembly elections, out of 637 candidates, 200 (31%) were crorepatis. Party Wise Crorepati Candidates: Out of 70 BJP candidates, 60 (86%) are crorepatis.
Similarly, out of 70 Congress candidates, 56 (80%) are millionaires. Of the 69 candidates in the Aam Aadmi Party, 31 (45%) are crorepatis. Of the 54 candidates of the Bahujan Samaj Party, 18 (33%) are crorepatis.
At the same time, 12 (29%) out of 42 candidates in UKD have declared assets worth more than Rs 1 crore. Average assets: The average assets per candidate, who contested the Uttarakhand Assembly Election 2022 is Rs 2.74 crore. The average asset per candidate for the 637 candidates in the 2017 Uttarakhand Assembly elections was Rs 1.57 crore.
Average assets by party: The average assets per candidate for 70 Congress candidates is Rs 6.93 crore. Similarly, the average asset per candidate in BJP is Rs 6.56 crore, in Aam Aadmi Party the average asset per candidate is Rs 2.95 crore, in UKD the average asset per candidate is Rs 2.79 crore. Similarly, the average asset per candidate in Bahujan Samaj Party is Rs 2.23 crore.
Candidates with zero assets: One independent candidate from BHEL is Mohammad Mursleen Qureshi. He has declared zero assets in his affidavit.
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