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Press Release: Delhi Assembly Elections 2025 : Analysis of Criminal Background, Financial, Education, Gender and other Details of Candidates

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Jan 27, 2025, 2:29:44 AMJan 27

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Press Release

Date: January 27, 2025

Dear Friends,

The Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR) and Delhi Election Watch have analysed the self-sworn affidavits of all 699 candidates, who are contesting in the Delhi 2025 Assembly Elections. Out of 699 contesting candidates, 278 are from National parties, 29 are from State parties, 254 are from registered unrecognized parties and 138 candidates are contesting Independently.

The full reports in English and Hindi can be accessed here: https://adrindia.org/content/Candidates_Report_Delhi_2025

Party	Total Contesting Candidates	Candidates with declared Criminal Cases	% of candidates with declared criminal cases	Candidates with declared serious criminal cases	% of candidates with declared serious criminal cases	No. of Candidates with assets ₹50 crores and above	Percentage of Candidates with assets ₹50 crores and above
National Parties	278	93	33%	51	18%	21	8%
State Parties	29	4	14%	3	10%	0	0%
Registered Unrecognized Party	254	21	8%	16	6%	0	0%
Independent	138	14	10%	11	8%	2	1%
Total	699	132	19%	81	12%	23	3%

Table: Party Category Wise Details

Summary and Highlights

Criminal Background

Candidates with Criminal Cases: Out of the 699 candidates analysed in Delhi Assembly elections 2025, 132(19%) candidates have declared criminal cases against themselves. In 2020 Delhi Assembly Elections, out of 672 candidates analysed, 133(20%) had declared criminal cases against themselves.

Candidates with Serious Criminal Cases: 81(12%) have declared serious criminal cases. In 2020 Delhi Assembly Elections, 104 (15%) candidates had declared serious criminal cases against themselves.

Figure: Comparative analysis of Candidates with declared Criminal Cases: 2020 vs 2025

Party wise Candidates with Criminal Cases: Among the major parties,44(63%) out of 70 candidates analysed from AAP, 29(41%) out of 70 candidates analysed from INC and 20 (29%) out of 68 candidates analysed from BJP have declared criminal cases against themselves in their affidavits.

Party wise Candidates with Serious Criminal Cases: Among the major parties,29(41%) out of 70 candidates analysed from AAP, 13(19%) out of 70 candidates analysed from INC and 9 (13%) out of 68 candidates analysed from BJP have declared serious criminal cases against themselves in their affidavits.

Figure: Party Wise Percentage of Candidates with Criminal Cases

Candidates with declared cases related to crime against women: 13 candidates have declared cases related to crime against women.

Candidates with declared cases related to murder: 2 candidates have declared cases related to murder (IPC Section-302) against themselves.

Candidates with declared cases related to attempt to murder: 5 candidates have declared cases related to Attempt to murder (IPC Section-307) against themselves.

The directions of the Supreme Court have had no effect on the political parties in selection of candidates in the Delhi Assembly Elections 2025 as they have again followed their old practice of giving tickets to around 19% candidates with criminal cases. All major parties contesting in Delhi Assembly Elections 2025 have given tickets from 12% to 63 % candidates who have declared criminal cases against themselves. The Supreme Court in its directions dated 13th February, 2020 had specifically instructed political parties to give reasons for such selection and why other individuals without criminal antecedents could not be selected as candidates. As per these mandatory guidelines, the reasons for such selection has to be with reference to qualifications, achievements and merit of the candidate concerned. During the recent 2 State Assembly elections held in 2024, it was observed that political parties gave unfounded and baseless reasons like popularity of the person, does good social work, cases are politically motivated etc. These are not sound and cogent reasons for fielding candidates with tainted backgrounds. This data clearly shows that political parties have no interest in reforming the electoral system and our democracy will continue to suffer at the hands of lawbreakers who become lawmakers.

Financial Background

Figure: Share of Wealth among the Contesting Candidates

Share of wealth among candidates: The share of wealth amongst the candidates contesting in the Delhi assembly elections 2025 is as follows:

Value of assets (Rs.)	Number of candidates	Percentage of Candidates
Rs. 5 crores and above	125	17.88%
Rs. 2 crores to Rs. 5 crores	77	11.02%
Rs. 50 lakhs to Rs. 2 crores	142	20.31%
Rs. 10 lakhs to Rs.50 lakhs	133	19.03%
less than Rs.10 lakhs	222	31.76%

Table: Share of wealth amongst contesting candidates

Billionaire Candidates: Out of the 699 candidates analysed, 5(1%) are Billionaires.

Party wise Billionaires Candidates: Among the major parties 3(4%) out of 68 candidates analysed from BJP, 1(1%) out of 70 candidates analysed from INC and 1(1%) out of 70 candidates analysed from AAP have declared assets valued more than Rs 100 crore.

Figure: Party wise percentage of Billionaires candidates

Candidates with assets ₹50 crores and above: Out of the 699 candidates analysed, 23(3%) candidates have assets worth Rs. 50 crores and above, this includes 5 billionaire candidates. In 2020 Delhi Assembly Elections, out of 672 candidates, 13(2%) had assets valued Rs. 50 crores and above.

Figure: Comparative analysis of candidates with assets ₹50 crores and above: 2020 Vs 2025

Party-wise candidates with assets (₹50 crores and above this includes 5 billionaire candidates): The role of money power in our elections is evident from the fact that all major political parties give tickets to wealthy candidates. Among the major parties 8(12%) out of 68 candidates analysed from BJP, 7(10%) out of 70 candidates analysed from INC, 6(9%) out of 70 candidates analysed from AAP and 2(1%) out of 138 Independent candidates analysed have declared assets valued more than Rs 50 crore.

Figure: Party-wise percentage of candidates with assets (₹50 crores and above)

Total assets of candidates: The total assets of 699 Candidates are Rs. 3,952 Crores.

Average assets: The average of assets per candidate contesting in the Delhi Assembly Elections 2025 is Rs 5.65 Crores. In 2020 Delhi Assembly Elections, average assets per candidate for 672 Candidates was Rs. 4.34 Crores.

Party wise average assets: Among major parties, the average assets per candidate for 70 INC candidates analysed is Rs. 14.41 Crores, 70 AAP candidates analysed is Rs 11.70 Crores, 68 BJP candidates have average assets of Rs 22.90 Crores and 68 BSP candidates have average assets worth Rs 1.23 Croes.

Billionaire candidates: The details of Billionaire candidates contesting in the Delhi Assembly Elections 2025 are given below:

S.No.	Name	District	Constituency	Party Name	Movable Assets (Rs)	Immovable Assets (Rs)	Total Assets (Rs)	PAN Given
1	Karnail Singh	North	Shakur Basti	BJP	92,36,090	2,58,75,00,000	2,59,67,36,090 259 Crore+	Y
2	Manjinder Singh Sirsa	West	Rajouri Garden	BJP	74,05,52,444	1,74,80,00,000	2,48,85,52,444 248 Crore+	Y
3	Gurcharan Singh (Raju)	East	Krishna Nagar	INC	52,90,52,000	78,00,00,000	1,30,90,52,000 130 Crore+	Y
4	Parvesh Sahib Singh	New Delhi	New Delhi	BJP	96,52,83,180	19,11,00,000	1,15,63,83,180 115 Crore+	Y
5	A Dhanwati Chandela A	West	Rajouri Garden	AAP	9,76,05,522	1,00,14,00,000	1,09,90,05,522 109 Crore+	Y

Table: Assets of Billionaire candidates

Zero assets candidates: There are 3 candidates who have declared zero assets. The details of these candidates are given below:

S.No.	Name	District	Constituency	Party Name	Movable Assets (Rs)	Immovable Assets (Rs)	Total Assets (Rs)	PAN Given
1	Shabana	North-East	Seelam Pur	Rashtriya Republican Party	0	0	0	Y
2	Yogesh Kumar	South-West	Matiala	IND	0	0	0	Y
3	Mohinder Singh	South-West	Matiala	Rashtriya Rashtrawadi Party	0	0	0	Y

Table: Candidates with declared zero assets

Low assets candidates: The details of three candidates with lowest assets (excluding zero assets candidates) are given below:

S.No.	Name	District	Constituency	Party Name	Movable Assets (Rs)	Immovable Assets (Rs)	Total Assets (Rs)	PAN Given
1	Ashok Kumar	South	Ambedkar Nagar	IND	6,586	0	6,586 6 Thou+	Y
2	Anita	New Delhi	New Delhi	IND	9,500	0	9,500 9 Thou+	Y
3	Khilkhilakar	North-West	Mangol Puri	Bahujan Shoshit Samaj Sangharsh Samta Party	10,000	0	10,000 10 Thou+	Y

Table: Candidates with declared lowest assets

Candidates with high liabilities: 317(45%) candidates have declared liabilities in their affidavits. The details of top three candidates with highest liabilities are given below:

S.No.	Name	District	Constituency	Party Name	Total Assets (Rs)	Liabilities (Rs)	Disputed liabilities (Rs)	PAN Given
1	Parvesh Sahib Singh	New Delhi	New Delhi	BJP	1,15,63,83,180 115 Crore+	74,36,64,614 74 Crore+	0	Y
2	Manjinder Singh Sirsa	West	Rajouri Garden	BJP	2,48,85,52,444 248 Crore+	57,68,03,791 57 Crore+	0	Y
3	Raaj Kumar Anand	New Delhi	Patel Nagar	BJP	79,85,29,298 79 Crore+	35,09,08,528 35 Crore+	0	Y

Table: Top three candidates with highest liabilities

Candidates with high income as declared in the ITR*: The details of top 3 candidates with high income declared in ITR are given below:

S.No.	Name	Party Name	Constituency	District Name	Total Assets (Rs)	Self Source of Income	Spouse's Source of Income	The financial year for which the last income tax return has been filed by candidate	Total income shown by candidate in ITR (Self+Spouse+Dependent) (Rs)	Self income shown by candidate in ITR (Rs)
1	Parvesh Sahib Singh	BJP	New Delhi	New Delhi	1,15,63,83,180 115 Crore+	Pension as Ex Member of Parliament, Partner in Partnership Firm i.e. M/S Sahib Automobile, Rent and Interest	Salary and Interest	2023-2024	20,60,33,660 20 Crore+	19,68,34,100 19 Crore+
2	Manjinder Singh Sirsa	BJP	Rajouri Garden	West	2,48,85,52,444 248 Crore+	Real Estate Business and Agriculture Income	Remuneration From Family Business	2023-2024	12,72,46,416 12 Crore+	12,67,20,616 12 Crore+
3	Sumesh Shokeen	AAP	Matiala	South-West	65,14,17,698 65 Crore+	Business	Rental Income	2023-2024	9,89,94,250 9 Crore+	9,81,02,810 9 Crore+

Table: Top 3 candidates with highest income as declared in ITR

Other Background Details

Education details of candidates: 324(46%) candidates have declared their educational qualifications to be between 5^th and 12^thstandard while 322(46%) candidates have declared having an educational qualification of graduate or above. 18 candidates are Diploma holders. 6 candidates have declared themselves to be just literate and 29 candidates are Illiterates.

Age details of candidates: 196(28%) candidates have declared their age to be between 25 to 40 years while 394 (56%) candidates have declared their age to be between 41 to 60 years. There are 106 (15%) candidates who have declared their age to be between 61 to 80 years. There are 3 candidates who have declared their age to be above 80 years.

Gender details of candidates: 96(14%) female candidates are contesting in the Delhi Assembly Elections 2025. In 2020 Delhi Assembly Elections, 79(12%) out of 672 candidates analysed were women.