83% Of MPs In India Are Crorepatis, 52% Belong To BJP; 33% Have Criminal Cases Against Them

Poorest MP from India has assets of Rs 34,000 only

By Mohul Ghosh On Mar 29, 2019

Starting April 11th, World’s biggest democracy goes for elections, and the nation is already gripped with the election fever.

Record 90 crore Indians will go out, and choose their representatives, and it is already been estimated that 2019 General Elections will be the costliest ever. $6 billion was spent in India, during the last elections.

In order to create more awareness about our elected representatives, Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR), which is an election watchdog, has released their latest report on the financial statistics of our current, sitting MPs (Member of Parliament).

Some stunning facts have been revealed in the report, regarding their wealth accumulation, and declared financial status.

The report has been compiled after analyzing self-sworn affidavits of 521 MPs, out of 543 sitting MPs.

Here are the major highlights:

83% of all sitting MPs in India are crorepatis, that is, having assets more than Rs 1 crore. This means 430 MPs have declared assets of more than 1 crore this election.
Most of the crorepati MPs belong to the ruling party: BJP. Out of 430 crorepati MPs, 52% of 227 MPs belong to BJP. In the last elections, BJP became the first political party in 30 years to form a clear majority in the elections.
Congress party, which is the main opposition, has 37 crorepati MPs, whereas at #3 position is AIADMK, which has 29 crorepati MPs.
32 MPs have admitted that they have assets of more than Rs 50 crore each, whereas there are two MPs who have declared assets less than Rs 5 lakh
Sumedhanand Saraswati, who is an MP from Sikar in Rajasthan, is the poorest MP as of now: He has assets of only Rs 34,311. He said that he is a sanyaasi and he doesn’t have any assets.
Rs 14.72 crore is the average wealth of an MP, who won 2014 elections and is a sitting MP right now.
Shatrughan Sinha, BJP MP from Patna who has now joined Congress saw his wealth increased by 780% between 2009 and 2014.
33% of all sitting MPs have criminal cases lodged against them
Out of that, 10 sitting MPs have criminal cases lodged against them. Out of these 10 MPs with murder cases, 4 belong to BJP, and one each from INC, NCP, LJP, RJD and two are independent MPs
Out of 33% MPs with criminal cases, 106 have cases related with a less-severe crime such as kidnapping, attempt to murder, women harassment etc.
Out of 14 MPs booked under attempt to murder, 8 belong to BJP.
Overall, 35% of all BJP MPs have some or the other criminal cases lodged against them.

As per the new Election Commission rules, every candidate who has a criminal case lodged needs to advertise the same in the newspapers before the election.

You can find more information about your elected leaders right here.

We will keep you updated, as we receive more news and views about General Elections 2019.

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