LS polls: 34 candidates have criminal cases across State

Hyderabad: As many as 34 candidates contesting from three major political parties including Congress, BRS, BJP and AIMIM in the Lok Sabha elections have criminal cases against them.

There are 33 candidates from these major political parties, who have assets worth Rs 10 crore or more. According to the data compiled by the Forum for Good Governance, as many as 839 candidates filed nomination papers. Out of these, 314 nominations were rejected by the Election Commission and some have withdrawn their nominations.

There are 17 Lok Sabha segments in the State and the final list of candidates in the fray is 525. In Secunderabad constituency, there are a maximum of 45 candidates in fray. For 17 constituencies there are 525 candidates, which means on an average 30 candidates per seat. By any standard this is not acceptable and is not good for democracy, said the FGG secretary M Padmanabha Reddy.

While the Congress has given tickets to three women, the BRS and BJP have given two tickets each to women. Regarding the educational qualifications, the BJP has the most number of postgraduates with 11, followed by Congress at 7, BRS at 5 and MIM one. The BJP has four graduates and two undergraduates followed by Congress which has four graduates and six undergraduates.The BRS has four graduates and eight undergraduates. Regarding the cases pending against the candidates, most of them were of trivial nature, since the candidates have shown them in their affidavit the FGG has taken them as it is.