254 of 391 candidates in Karnataka face criminal charges

Bengaluru: An analysis of the affidavits filed before the Election Commission of India has revealed that of the 391 candidates contesting the elections to the Karnataka Legislative Assembly, 254 have serious criminal cases against them.

Karnataka Election Watch and the Association for Democratic Reforms carried out the analysis which shows that four candidates have declared cases related to murder (Section 302 of the Indian Penal Code) and as many as 23 candidates are facing cases related to crimes against women.

Trilochan Sastry of the ADR informed the press that that they were able to analyze the affidavits of 2,560 of the total 2,655 candidates contesting the elections.The affidavits of the remaining candidates could not be analysed as they were either incomplete or badly scanned.

Among the major parties, 83 of the 224 candidates of the BJP, 59 of the 220 candidates of the Congress, 41 of the 199 candidates of the Janata Dal (Secular) were facing criminal cases. Serious criminal cases (offence with maximum punishment of imprisonment for five or more and is non-bailable) have been booked against 58 candidates of the BJP, 32 of the Congress, and 29 of the JD(S).

Mr. Sastry wanted to know how the parties planned to fight corruption when their own candidates were facing criminal charges.

The analysis reveals that 25% of the constituencies — 56 segments — had been labelled as ‘Red Alert’ constituencies, where in three or more candidates have declared criminal cases against themselves.

Some of the “Red Alert” constituencies are Shikaripur in Shivamogga district, Ballari City in Ballari district, Sringeri in Chikkamagaluru district, Molakalmur in Chitradurga district, and K.R. Puram, Rajarajeshwarinagar, Hebbal, Govindarajanagar, Malleswaram, Chamarajpet, and Gandhinagar in Bengaluru.

Mr. Sastry urged citizens to only vote for candidates with no criminal background, and requested citizens to reject the gifts, bribes and other freebies.