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The Sentinel
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If 72 sitting MLAs in Assam are crorepatis, they have 16 counterparts who owe liabilities of Rs 1 crore and above.

This has come to the light after the 'Association for Democratic Reforms' (ADR) and the 'Assam Election Watch' analyzed the assets details of the MLAs on the basis of the lawmakers' respective affidavits submitted to the Election Commission of India (ECI).

MLAs Wazed Ali Choudhury (Congress), Narayan Deka (BJP) and Prafulla Kumar Mahanta (AGP) have the highest liabilities of more than Rs 6 crore, Rs 4 crore plus and more than Rs 4 crore respectively.

As many as 13 MLAs have liabilities of Rs 1 crore and above. They are Himanta Biswa Sarma (Finance, Health & PWD Minister), Chandan Brahma (Tourism Minister), Naba Kumar Doley (Cultural Minister), Padma Hazarika (BJP), Naren Sonowal (AGP), Bhaskar Sarma (BJP), Ashok Anand Singhal (BJP), Abdur Rahim Azmal (AIUDF), Aminul Haq Laskar(BJP), Krishnendu Paul (BJP), Binanda Kumar Saikia (BJP), Nizam Uddin Choudhury (AIUDF) and Ashok Kumar Singhi (BJP).

The analysis also found that 90 sitting MLAs have declared their liabilities of Rs 50,32,73,412. The BJP has 49 MLAs owing liabilities of Rs 24,05,63,465 followed by 14 Congress MLAs (Rs 10,18,41,419); 10 AGP MLAs (Rs 8,61,69,792); six BPF MLAs (Rs 3,76,96,669); 10 AIUDF MLAs (Rs 3,52,02,067) and Independent MLA (Rs 18,00,000).

As against this list of MLAs with liabilities, more than 60 per cent of the sitting MLAs in the State are crorepatis. If the present trend of crorepati MLAs continues, the Assam Assembly will have 100 crorepati legislators at the end of 2021 elections. In 2026, the Assembly may see all the 126 MLAs as crorepatis.