The second phase of 2019 Lok Sabha elections kicked off on Thursday, 18 April, and out of all the candidates contesting in this phase, 11% are facing serious criminal charges, 16% have admitted that they are facing criminal charges, 27% have assets worth Rs 1 crore and more in possession, as per an analysis of candidates’ affidavits by the Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR).
The data comes as a result of the 1,590 affidavits out of 1,644 candidates that are battling it out in phase two, as the affidavits of the remaining 54 turned out to be either illegible or incomplete.
IndiaSpend analysed and compared the self-sworn affidavits of candidates who are currently the sitting members of the 16th Lok Sabha and are re-contesting in the second phase, to calculate the percent change in their declared assets, including the 2014 Lok Sabha election affidavits available at the Election Commission of India’s affidavit website and affidavit archive.
Approximately 27% of 1,590 candidates have declared assets worth Rs 1 crore and more. Coming to the crorepatis, among the major parties, all candidates of All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) are crorepatis and followed by Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK), in which 23 out of 24 candidates are crorepatis.
According to the analysis, 39 candidates whose assets increased witnessed a 67% rise on an average , whereas the five candidates whose assets shrank saw a decrease of 19% on an average since 2014. It also added that the total wealth of the 44 sitting MPs as declared in 2019 amounts to more than Rs 1,262 crore which, coincidentally is equivalent to the total cost of constructing 6,000 km of flexible rural roads under the Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana.
Top Three MPs With The Highest Increase In Assets
The maximum number of MPs with the highest increase in wealth in the past five years are from Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) which leads with 15 MPs, there are six from All India National Congress (AICC), four from AIADMK, three from Shiv Sena and two each from Communist Party of India (Marxist) Rashtriya Janata Dal. One each from All India Trinamool Congress, All India Democratic Front, Biju Janata Dal, Janata Dal (Secular), Janata Dal (United), National Congress Party and Pattali Makkal Katchi.
DK Suresh of the Congress party, the MP for the Bangalore rural constituency of Karnataka has seen the highest percentage of increase in his wealth. In 2014, his assets were worth Rs 85 crore which increased to Rs 338 crore in 2019 – an increase of 295 percent.
According to PRS Legislative Research data, his attendance in the Lok Sabha is 85%; he has participated in 91 debates against the national average of 67.1 and has asked 648 questions against the national average of 293. Suresh has five criminal cases pending against him all of which are under sections of Karnataka Forest Rules 1969 and Karnataka Forest Act 1963. Apart from this, he is also accused of quarrying and erecting electrical lines in a reserved forest area.
Prataprao Ganpatrao Jadhav of Shiv Sena from the Buddhana constituency of Maharashtra holds the second position with a 223% growth in his assets. His assets are at 11.6 crore in 2019 as compared to Rs 3.6 in 2014.His attendance has been at 70% and he has participated in 51 debates and asked 492 questions. Jadhav has three pending criminal cases with seven serious charges under the Indian Penal Code that relate to false evidence, criminal breach of trust, cheating and dishonestly inducing delivery of property.
On the third position is Jual Oram of the BJP who is the outgoing Union Minister for Tribal Affairs and MP for Sundargarh constituency in Odisha. He had declared assets worth Rs 2.4 crore in 2014 which has undergone a 206% increase in 2019 to 7.4%. As far as the cases are concerned, he has two pending cases with charges relating to unlawful assembly, wrongful restraint, and danger or obstruction in public way or line of navigation.
To add, Hema Malini, a star campaigner of BJP and the MP for the Mathura constituency of Uttar Pradesh has also witnessed an increase of 45.6% in her assets since 2014, from Rs 178 crore to Rs 259 crore in 2019.
MPs With Biggest Decrease In Assets
There has also been a substantial decrease in the assets of five sitting MPs over their 16th Lok Sabha term. This includes Biren Singh Engti of Congress who represents the Autonomous District constituency in Assam. His assets have decreased by 78% – from Rs 3 crore in 2014 to Rs 78 lakhs in 2019.
Others like, P Venugopal of the AIADMK representing Tiruvallur in Tamil Nadu, saw a 20% decrease; Farooq Abdullah, Jammu and Kashmir National Conference MP for Srinagar, J&K had a 14% decrease; J Jayavardhan of the AIADMK from Chennai South, Tamil Nadu, had a 3% decrease; and BN Chandrappa of the Congress from Chitradurga, Karnataka, witnessed a 0.8% decrease in assets between 2014 and 2019.
Candidates With Assets Worth Crores
Among the major parties, the percentage of candidates who have declared assets worth more than Rs 1 crore are all candidates of the AIADMK, 96% (23 of 24) of the DMK, 88% (45 of 51) of the BJP, 87% (46 of 53) of the Congress and 26% (21 of 80) of the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP).
However, the three richest candidates in the second phase are all from Congress. Vasanthakumar H from the Kanyakumari constituency of Tamil Nadu has total assets worth more than Rs 417 crore.
Uday Singh from the Purnia constituency of Bihar has total assets worth more than Rs 341 crore.
Lastly, DK Suresh, contesting from the Bangalore Rural constituency of Karnataka, has total assets worth more than Rs 338 crore as mentioned earlier.
The three richest candidates also have the highest liabilities. Vasanthakumar has liabilities of more than Rs 154 crore, Singh’s liabilities are more than Rs 71 crore and Suresh has liabilities of more than Rs 51 crore.
The top three candidates with the highest declared income during the past financial year are Vasanthakumar H of the Congress from the Kanyakumari constituency of Tamil Nadu, who is also the richest candidate; Manju of the BJP from the Hassan constituency of Karnataka, and Arun Wankhade of the BSP from the Amravati constituency of Maharashtra.
Talking about their sources of income, Vasanthakumar who has income of more than Rs 28 crore mentioned business as his source of income. Manju has an income of more than Rs 12 crore and has mentioned self-employment as his source of income, while Wankhade whose income is more than Rs 4 crore has stated that his income is sourced from property business, consultancy and contractor-ship.
Criminal Charges
Among the major parties, the highest proportion of candidates facing criminal charges are from DMK, 46% (11 of 24) of whose candidates face criminal charges. Of 53 Congress candidates, 43% (23) have declared criminal cases pending against them, compared with 31% (16 of 51) from the BJP and 20% (16 of 80) from the BSP. Among other parties, 36% (4 of 11) of the Shiv Sena’s candidates and 14% (3 of 22) of AIADMK candidates have declared criminal charges.
Of the 167 candidates facing serious criminal charges are 17 of the Congress’ 53 (32%), 10 of the BJP’s 51 (20%), 10 of the BSP’s 80 (13%), 7 of the DMK’s 24 (29%), 3 of the AIADMK’s 22 (14%) and 1 of the Shiv Sena’s 11 (9%).
The ADRA analysis shows that three candidates facing serious criminal charges have declared that they have been convicted in the past. Six have declared they are facing cases related to murder, 25 have declared cases related to attempt to murder, eight related to kidnapping, 10 relating to crime against women and 15 related to hate speech.
Indiaspend also reported – on 11 April 2019 – the criminal charges against the candidates contesting in the Phase 1 of the 17th Lok Sabha elections.
In phase 1, 17% faced criminal charges, of which 12% faced serious criminal charges
Educational Qualifications
Of the 1,590 candidates, 697 (44%) have declared their educational qualification to be between 5th and 12th standard, while 756 (47%) candidates hold a graduate degree or above, and 29 candidates have a doctorate degree.
On the other hand, 35 (2.2%) candidates have declared they are literate and 26 (1.6%) said that they are illiterate.
Age Profile
In phase 2, 525 of 1,590 candidates (or 33% ) are in the 25-40 years age group, while more than half (51%) or 805 candidates are aged between 41 and 60 years, as per the affidavits analysed by ADR.
Another 246 (15%) candidates are aged between 61-80 years, while seven candidates are aged above 80 years. Six candidates have not declared their age and one said he is 24 years old, younger than the qualifying age to contest Lok Sabha elections.
Gender Profile
Coming to the gender distribution, of the 1,590 candidates, 1,470 (92.45%) are males and 120 (8%) are females, as compared to 1,177 (92.9%) males and 89 (7%) females among 1,266 candidates in the first phase. No other gender has been specified by the candidates.
(This article has been published in an arrangement with Indiaspend)
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