Election Commissioner H S Brahma on Wednesday said over 90 per cent of the 1,600 political parties registered with the Election Commission had been floated to evade tax.
Speaking at the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) National Conference and Annual Session, Brahma said barely 85 to 90 of the total registered parties fought the “real battle”. He said the rest of the over 1,500 political parties were “a big enigma” and used the front of a political party to get income tax exemption and purchase jewelry, houses, plots of land and do sundry other business activities.
Brahma said muscle and money power were the biggest threats to India’s democracy. “The biggest challenge today is the nexus between political leadership and criminals and the second bigger challenge is money power, which impacts the selection of candidates,” he said, adding he would tend to agree with the assessment by a researcher that 20,000 of the 60,000 candidates to have ever fought elections were tainted.
“It is unfortunate that bigger the money and muscle power, better the chances of victory,” said Brahma. He recounted how 10 days ago, a candidate demanded the election expense limit for a Lok Sabha candidate should have been increased to Rs 3-4 crore. “Why raise it to just Rs 70 lakh, the candidate from a constituency in Rayalaseema asked me. He claimed he would spend as much as Rs 35 crore,” said Brahma.
The Election Commissioner said he was aghast. “The candidate told me he was confident of raising that money from somewhere,” said Brahma. But Brahma said he was in for another surprise when the candidate claimed another candidate from Chittoor would be spending nearly Rs 100 crore to ensure his victory from that seat and, God willing, get a ministerial portfolio as well. Brahma didn’t name either of the candidates.
Speaking at the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) National Conference and Annual Session, Brahma said barely 85 to 90 of the total registered parties fought the “real battle”. He said the rest of the over 1,500 political parties were “a big enigma” and used the front of a political party to get income tax exemption and purchase jewelry, houses, plots of land and do sundry other business activities.
Brahma said muscle and money power were the biggest threats to India’s democracy. “The biggest challenge today is the nexus between political leadership and criminals and the second bigger challenge is money power, which impacts the selection of candidates,” he said, adding he would tend to agree with the assessment by a researcher that 20,000 of the 60,000 candidates to have ever fought elections were tainted.
“It is unfortunate that bigger the money and muscle power, better the chances of victory,” said Brahma. He recounted how 10 days ago, a candidate demanded the election expense limit for a Lok Sabha candidate should have been increased to Rs 3-4 crore. “Why raise it to just Rs 70 lakh, the candidate from a constituency in Rayalaseema asked me. He claimed he would spend as much as Rs 35 crore,” said Brahma.
The Election Commissioner said he was aghast. “The candidate told me he was confident of raising that money from somewhere,” said Brahma. But Brahma said he was in for another surprise when the candidate claimed another candidate from Chittoor would be spending nearly Rs 100 crore to ensure his victory from that seat and, God willing, get a ministerial portfolio as well. Brahma didn’t name either of the candidates.
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