1,460 lawmakers have criminal cases against them: survey

A total of 1,460 MPs and MLAs have declared criminal cases against themselves in their affidavits submitted to Election Commission before contesting elections.
An analysis of affidavits filed by 4,807 sitting MPs and MLAs carried out by Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR) and National Election Watch (NEW) in the wake of today's Supreme Court directions reveals that 688 (14 per cent) of the total analyzed have declared serious criminal cases against themselves.
The NGO said 162 (30 per cent) out of the 543 Lok Sabha MPs have declared criminal cases against themselves and 14 per cent of the current Lok Sabha MPs have declared serious criminal cases against themselves.

It said a total of 1,258 (31 per cent) out of the 4032 sitting MLAs from all state assemblies have declared criminal cases against themselves and 15 per cent of them have declared serious criminal cases against themselves.
The analysis further revealed that the Jharkhand 2009 Assembly has the highest percentage of 74 per cent elected representatives who declared criminal cases against them, with 55 out of 74 MLAs of the Jharkhand 2009 Assembly declaring criminal cases against themselves.
The Bihar 2010 Assembly has 58 per cent MLAs who have declared criminal cases against themselves, while the Uttar Pradesh 2012 Assembly has 47 per cent MLAs with criminal cases.

Incidently, none of the MLAs of the Manipur 2012 Assembly have declared criminal cases against themselves.

The ADR analysis revealed that 82 per cent of MPs and MLAs who have gotten elected on JMM tickets have declared criminal cases against themselves, while 64 per cent of MPs and MLAs who have gotten elected on RJD tickets have declared criminal cases against themselves.
Besides, 48 per cent of elected representatives who have gotten elected on SP tickets have declared criminal cases against themselves.
It also revealed that 31 per cent of MPs and MLAs who have gotten elected on BJP tickets have declared criminal cases against themselves. Out of the 1017 MPs and MLAs from BJP, 313 have declared criminal cases.

Also, 21 per cent of MPs and MLAs who have gotten elected on Congress tickets have declared criminal cases against themselves (Out of the 1433 elected representatives from INC, 305 have declared criminal cases against themselves), the NGO survey says.