Candidates with criminal charges higher this MCD polls, more women in the fray: ADR  report

• Criminal cases against 10% candidates in Delhi municipal poll fray
• BJP has maximum millionaire candidates
• AAP has most candidates with criminal backgrounds

The Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR) report, released on Saturday, on candidates in the fray for Delhi’s municipal polls showed that 139 people (10% of all nominations) vying to become a councillor in the national capital have criminal charges against them. The report said 76 of them face serious criminal charges.

The percentage of candidates with criminal cases against them is higher during these elections, compared to the previous campaign in 2017. The Aam Aadmi Party has fielded the maximum 45 candidates with criminal records in municipal elections this year while the BJP has 27 such candidates, it said.

“Among the major parties, 19 (8 per cent) out of 248 candidates analysed from AAP, 14 (6%) out of 249 candidates analysed from BJP and 12 (5%) out of 245 candidates analysed from INC have declared serious criminal cases against themselves in their affidavits,” the report added.

The AAP has pitched 250 candidates, out of which 248 self-sworn affidavits were analysed by the ADR and 18 per cent of them i.e 45 have criminal records, the report of the democracy advocate organization. It added 8 per cent of them face serious criminal charges.

The BJP, which has also pitched 250 candidates, has 27 candidates (11 per cent) with criminal records and the Congress has fielded 25 such candidates.

The report said: “45 (18 per cent) out of 248 candidates analysed from AAP, 27 (11 per cent) out of 249 candidates analysed from BJP and 25 (10 per cent) out of 245 candidates analysed from INC have declared criminal cases against themselves in their affidavits.” It said: “Among the major parties, 19 (8 per cent) out of 248 candidates analysed from AAP, 14 (6%) out of 249 candidates analysed from BJP and 12 (5%) out of 245 candidates analysed from INC have declared serious criminal cases against themselves in their affidavits.”

This year, 1,394 are in the running for a seat in Civic Centre and, of them, ADR analysed 1,336 affidavits. “The remaining 13 could be not analysed due to poor scanning or non-availability of documents,” ADR said. The polling will be held on December 4.

More women the fray

This time, however, the number of women nominees increased compared with the previous MCD polls. All the major political parties including the BJP, Congress and the AAP have fielded more women candidates than men this year in the upcoming December 4 MCD polls. The ADR report said that 693 (52 per cent) female candidates are contesting in the MCD election. In 2017 MCD Elections, 1,127 (49 per cent) out of 2,315 candidates were women. The report showed that a total of 136 out of 249 candidates fielded by the BJP are women. Similarly, AAP has fielded 136 woman candidates and Congress has fielded 132 female candidates.

-INDIA NEWS STREAM