Press Release: Tripura Assembly Elections 2023: Analysis of Criminal Background, Financial, Education, Gender and other Details of Candidates

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Feb 6, 2023, 1:35:19 AM2/6/23

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Press Release

6th February, 2023

Dear Friends,

The Tripura Election Watch and Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR) have analysed the self-sworn affidavits of all 259 candidates who are contesting in the Tripura Assembly Elections 2023. Out of 259 candidates analysed, 140 are from National parties, 9 are from State parties, 52 are from registered unrecognized parties and 58 candidates are contesting independently.

The full reports in English and Hindi can be accessed here: https://adrindia.org/content/analysis-criminal-background-financial-education-gender-and-other-details-candidates-tripura

Summary and Highlights

Criminal Background

Candidates with Criminal Cases: Out of 259 candidates analyzed, 41 (16%) candidates have declared criminal cases against themselves. In 2018 Tripura Assembly Elections, out of 297 candidates analysed, 22(7%) had declared criminal cases against themselves.

Candidates with Serious Criminal Cases: 21(8%) have declared serious criminal cases against themselves. In 2018 Tripura Assembly Elections, 17(6%) candidates had declared serious criminal cases against themselves.

Figure: Comparative analysis of Candidates with declared Criminal Cases: 2018 vs 2023

Party wise Candidates with Criminal Cases: Among the major parties, 7(54%) out of 13 candidates analysed from INC, 13(30%) out of 43 candidates analysed from CPI(M) and 9 (16%) out of 55 candidates analysed from BJP have declared criminal cases against themselves in their affidavits.

Figure: Party Wise Percentage of Candidates with Criminal Cases

Party wise Candidates with Serious Criminal Cases: Among the major parties, 2(15%) out of 13 candidates analysed from INC, 5(12%) out of 43 candidates analysed from CPI(M) and 5 (9%) out of 55 candidates analysed from BJP have declared serious criminal cases against themselves in their affidavits.

Candidates with declared cases related to attempt to murder: 8 candidates have declared cases related to Attempt to murder (IPC Section-307) against themselves.

Red Alert Constituencies*: 2(3%) out of 60 constituencies are Red alert constituencies. Red alert constituencies are those where 3 or more contesting candidates have declared criminal cases against themselves.

The directions of the Supreme Court have had no effect on the political parties in selection of candidates in the Tripura Assembly Elections 2023 as they have again followed their old practice of giving tickets to around 16% candidates with criminal cases. All major parties contesting in Tripura elections have given tickets to 16 % to 54 % 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 7 State Assembly elections held in 2022, 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 Tripura assembly elections 2023 is as follows:

Value of assets (Rs.)	Number of candidates	Percentage of Candidates
5 crores and above	9	3%
2 crores to 5 crores	20	8%
50 lakhs to 2 crores	59	23%
10 lakhs to 50 lakhs	70	27%
less than 10 lakhs	101	39%

Table: Share of wealth amongst contesting candidates

Crorepati Candidates: Out of the 259 candidates, 45(17%) are crorepatis. In 2018 Tripura Assembly Elections, out of 297 candidates, 35 (12%) were crorepatis.

Figure: Comparative Analysis of Crorepati Candidates: 2018 Vs 2023

Party wise Crorepati 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 17(31%) out of 55 candidates analysed from BJP, 6(46%) out of 13 candidates analysed from INC and 7(16%) out of 43 candidates analysed from CPI(M) have declared assets valued more than Rs 1 crore.

Figure: Party Wise Percentage of Crorepati Candidates

Average assets: The average of assets per candidate contesting in the Tripura Assembly Elections 2023 is Rs 86.37 Lakhs. In the 2018 Tripura Assembly Elections, average assets per candidate for 297 candidates was Rs.46.92 lakhs.

Party wise average assets: Among major parties, the average assets per candidate for 55 BJP candidates analysed is Rs. 1.86 Crores, 13 INC candidates analysed is Rs 2.20 Crores, 43 CPI(M) candidates analysed is Rs 53.94 Lakhs and 42 Tipra Motha Party candidates have average assets worth Rs.78.57 Lakhs.

High asset candidates: The details of top 3 candidates with highest declared assets, contesting in the Tripura Assembly Elections are given below:

S.No.	Name	District	Constituency	Party	Movable Assets (Rs)	Immovable Assets (Rs)	Total Assets (Rs)	PAN Given
1	Jishnu Dev Varma	Sepahijala	Charilam (ST)	BJP	2,03,60,395	13,55,00,000	15,58,60,395 15 Crore+	Y
2	Manik Saha	West Tripura	Town Bardowali	BJP	1,10,29,020	12,80,00,000	13,90,29,020 13 Crore+	Y
3	Abhijit Sarkar	Khowai	Teliamura	Tipra Motha Party	42,45,336	12,15,00,000	12,57,45,336 12 Crore+	Y

Table: Top three candidates with highest declared assets

Low assets candidates: The details of three candidates with lowest assets are as follows:

S.No.	Name	District	Constituency	Party	Movable Assets (Rs)	Immovable Assets (Rs)	Total Assets (Rs)	PAN Given
1	Hiramuni Debbarma	West Tripura	Mandai Bazar (ST)	IND	700^*	0	700 7 Hund+	Y
2	Nagendra Chandra Shil	Khowai	Kalyanpur-Pramodnagar	IND	1,200	0	1,200 1 Thou+	Y
3	Mridul Kanti Sarkar	West Tripura	Badharghat (SC)	IND	2,000	0	2,000 2 Thou+	Y

Table: Candidates with declared lowest assets

* on assets value indicates that the candidate has not provided the total in their affidavits, it has been calculated on the basis of details provided by them in the same

Candidates with high liabilities: 125(48%) 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)	PAN Given
1	Chayan Bhattacharya	North Tripura	Dharmanagar	INC	35,50,533 35 Lacs+	3,07,24,702 3 Crore+	Y
2	Milton Chakma	Gomati	Karbook (ST)	AITC	5,66,33,000 5 Crore+	1,81,45,000 1 Crore+	Y
3	Samir Basu	West Tripura	Majlishpur	Tipra Motha Party	2,03,06,621 2 Crore+	99,71,624 99 Lacs+	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	Total Asset (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	Pranajit Singha Roy	BJP	Radhakishorpur	Gomati	7,32,92,599 7 Crore+	Business	Business	2021-2022	58,66,710 58 Lacs+	42,75,920 42 Lacs+
2	Atul Debbarma	IND	Krishnapur (ST)	Khowai	4,20,58,345 4 Crore+	Pension and Salary from Tripura Legislative Assembly	Employee of Municipal Corporation of Delhi	2021-2022	57,15,080 57 Lacs+	11,37,620 11 Lacs+
3	Tinku Roy	BJP	Chandipur	Unakoti	4,36,82,067 4 Crore+	Business	Business	2021-2022	43,28,944 43 Lacs+	36,30,008 36 Lacs+

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

Undeclared PAN: A total of 15(6%) candidates have not declared their PAN details.

Other Background Details

Education details of candidates: 139(54%) candidates have declared their educational qualifications to be between 5^th and 12^thstandard while 116 (45%) candidates have declared having an educational qualification of graduate or above. 2 candidates are Diploma holders and 2 candidates have declared themselves to be just literate.

Age details of candidates: 63(24%) candidates have declared their age to be between 25 to 40 years while 142(55%) candidates have declared their age to be between 41 to 60 years. There are 54(21%) candidates who have declared their age to be between 61 to 80 years.

Gender details of candidates: 30(12%) female candidates are contesting in the Tripura assembly election 2023. In 2018 Tripura Assembly Elections, 24(8%) out of 297 candidates analysed were women.

Recommendations of ADR

To remedy the existing problem of criminalization is to immediately act upon the plausible solutions offered by various committees, civil society and citizens. Supreme Court of India being the ultimate custodian of “Justice and Rule of Law” should reprimand political parties and politicians for their complete lack of will, reprehensible predilection and absence of required laws.

Permanent disqualification of candidates convicted for heinous crimes like murder, rape, smuggling, dacoity, kidnapping etc.

Disqualification of persons from contesting elections to the public offices against whom charges have been framed for having committed serious criminal offences punishable by imprisonment of at least 5 years, and the case is filed at least 6 months prior to the election in question.

Cancellation of tax exemptions given to the political parties who field such tainted candidates.

Bringing political parties under the Right to Information Act.

De-register and de-recognise any political party if it knowingly puts up a candidate with a tainted background.

Political party should annually file the information on criminal antecedents of their Office Bearers and make such records available to the public, including NIL records.

Disqualification of candidates furnishing false information in the election affidavit (Form 26).

Ensure trial of cases in which the politicians are accused to be concluded in a time bound manner.

Implementation of SC judgment dated 23^rd September, 2013 (i.e provision of NOTA buttons on the EVMs) in its letter and spirit by ensuring a) if NOTA gets more votes than any of the candidates, none of the candidates should be declared elected, and a fresh election should be held; b) in the fresh election, none of the candidates in the earlier election, in which NOTA got the highest number of votes, should be allowed to contest.

Implementation of the 25^th September, 2018 and 13^th February, 2020 SC orders on 'publication of criminal cases against candidates selected by political parties along with reasons for such selection' in its letter and spirit by directing the Election Commission of India a) to list out names of such tainted candidates selected by the political parties along with such reasons for such selection C8 including diligent publication of reasons in newspapers, T.V channels, party website etc, b) strict and constant reminders by ROs to the defaulters, c) list needs to be religiously prepared and submitted to the Supreme Court after every election, d) uploading of this list on ECI’s website for public inspection, e) a suitably heavy financial penalty levied on political parties for making insufficient disclosures, invalid and common reasons, selection of candidates based on winnability and f) Officer in-charge of a political party pertaining to submission of a compliance report should also be held accountable for such a breach.

The Election Commission of India and all State Election Commissions should make it mandatory in all elections; Parliamentary, Assembly and Local Body elections to carry display boards outside each and every polling booth showing a summarised version of candidates’ affidavits. The polling booths should essentially display details of candidate’s criminal records, assets and liabilities and education qualification.

The Election Commission of India under its ‘Systematic Voters’ Education and Electoral Participation’ (SVEEP) as well as through other national campaigns on voter awareness held before every election should inform and aware the voters that (i) taking and giving cash or gifts/freebies for votes is a criminal offense, (ii) such instances should be brought to the notice of the ECI through its web application, (iii) inform voters that information on criminal records of candidates is available on the ECI website, outside polling booths and other sources that the ECI may use.

Political parties in India should be required to announce/publish the list of candidates contesting elections at least 3 months prior to elections.

Role of money and muscle power is evident from the fact that all major political parties in Tripura assembly elections 2023 have fielded 16% to 46% candidates who are crorepatis and 16% to 54% candidates who have declared criminal cases against themselves. This close and alarming nexus between money power and muscle power has got so ingrained in our electoral system that the citizens are left hostage to the current situation. Money and muscle power hurt the principles of 'free and fair elections', 'participatory democracy' and 'level playing field'. The present circumstances therefore demand an extensive deliberation by the voters so that sanctity of elections is not ridiculed by tenacious entry of tainted candidates and candidates with abnormal multiplication of assets.

Contact Details

Tripura Election Watch

Dr. Biswendu Bhattacharjee

State Coordinator

+91-94361-25214
biswendu...@gmail.com

National Election Watch/Association for Democratic Reforms

Media and Journalist Helpline

+91 80103 94248

Email: a...@adrindia.org

Maj.Gen. Anil Verma (Retd)

Head

Association for Democratic Reforms,