Analysis said six candidates have stated cases related to crime against women. (representative)
Of the 584 candidates running for election in Uttar Pradesh’s upcoming Phase 2 election, about 147 candidates (25 percent) have criminal cases against themselves, the Association for Democratic Reforms said on Wednesday.
The Uttar Pradesh Election Watch and the Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR) have analyzed the self affidavits of 584 of the 586 candidates who ran in Uttar Pradesh’s parliamentary elections. The affidavits of two candidates were not analyzed because they were either poorly scanned, or because the full affidavits had not been uploaded to the election commission’s website.
Of the 584 candidates analysed, 147 (25 percent) candidates have brought criminal proceedings against themselves, while 113 candidates (19 percent) have declared serious criminal proceedings against themselves.
Among the major parties analyzed 35 candidates (67 percent) of the 52 candidates of the Samajwadi Party (SP), 23 (43 percent) of the 54 candidates of the Congress, 20 (36 percent) of the 55 candidates from the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP), 18 (34 percent) of the 53 candidates of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), one (33 percent) of the three candidates of the Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD) and seven (14 percent) of the 49 candidates of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) have declared criminal cases against themselves in their affidavits.
Of the major parties, 25 (48 percent) of the 52 candidates from the SP, 16 (30 percent) of the 54 candidates from Congress, 15 (27 percent) of the 55 candidates from the BSP, 11 (21 percent) from the 53 candidates of the BJP have declared serious criminal cases against themselves in their affidavits for one (33 percent) of RLD’s three candidates and six (12 percent) of AAP’s 49 candidates.
The analysis shows that six candidates reported cases related to crime against women. One candidate has declared murder-related cases (IPC section 302) against himself.
About 18 candidates have self-declared cases related to ‘attempted murder’ (IPC section 307).
About 29 (53 percent) of the 55 constituencies are ‘red alert’ constituencies. Constituencies with red alerts are those where three or more candidates have brought a criminal case against themselves.
Of the 584 candidates, 260 (45 percent) are crorepatis.
Parliamentary elections will be held in seven stages from February 10 to March 7 in Uttar Pradesh to elect all 403 members of the Uttar Pradesh Legislative Assembly.
The votes will be counted and the results will be announced on March 10.