120 (18%) candidates from 3 major political parties (INC, BJP and BSP) in Madhya Pradesh have declared serious criminal cases

Madhya Pradesh Election Watch (MPEW) and Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR) have analysed the self-sworn affidavits of candidates from three major parties, INC, BJP and BSP in the Madhya Pradesh State Assembly Elections. A total of 2583 candidates filed affidavits with the ECI among whom 686 candidates were from the major parties. Out of these 686 candidates, 683 were analysed.

·         Candidates with Criminal Cases: Out of the 683 candidates analysed 206 candidates (30%) have declared criminal cases against them.

·         Candidates with Serious Criminal Cases: Out of the 206 candidates who have declared criminal cases, 120 have declared serious criminal cases. These include murder, attempt to murder, kidnapping, criminal intimidation and crime against women. 50 (22%) candidates from INC, 37 (16%) from BJP and 33 (15%) from BSP have declared serious criminal cases.

·         Party wise Candidates with Criminal Cases: 91 of 228 (40%) candidates fielded by INC have declared criminal cases against them while 61 out of 229 (27%) candidates from BJP and 54 out of 226 (24%) candidates from BSP have declared criminal cases in their affidavits.

·         Party –wise Comparison of Candidates with Criminals Cases with 2008 Assembly Elections: INC had 31%candidates with criminal cases in the 2008 Assembly Elections for Madhya Pradesh, which has risen to 40% in 2013 Assembly Elections. BJP had 22%candidates with criminal cases in the 2008 Assembly Elections which has risen to 27% in 2013 Assembly Elections. BSP had 20%candidates with criminal cases in the 2008 Assembly Elections which has risen to 24% in 2013

·         Red Alert Constituencies*: 10 constituencies have at least 3 candidates from these political parties with declared criminal cases.*Red Alert Constituencies are those which have 3 or more candidates with criminal cases standing up for elections. This analysis excludes independent candidates with criminal cases.

·         Cases related to Murder and Attempt to Murder: 2 candidates have declared murder charges against themselves while7 candidates declared attempt to murder charges. Brajendra Singh of INC from Prithvipur constituency and Sukhlal Prasad of BSP from Nagod constituency have declared murder charges against themselves.

·         Cases related to Kidnapping and Wrongful Confinement: 5 candidates have declared kidnapping charges against them.

·         Crimes against Women: 5 candidates have declared crimes against women.3 of these 5 candidates have declared charges related to husband or relative of husband of a woman subjecting her to cruelty (IPC Section-498A). 1 candidate has declared case related to outraging a woman’s modesty and one candidate has declared a case related toenticing or taking away or detaining with criminal intent a married woman.

·         Cases registered under Prevention of Corruption Act: 8 candidates have declared cases under Prevention of Corruption Act.

Note: Affidavits of Kailash Vijayvargiya (BJP), Uday Prakash Mishra (INC) and Vijay Singh Chouhan (BSP) have not been analysed due to issues in their affidavits like missing pages, bad scan etc.