A countless number of criminals pervade our current political system. Advocate Vijayan Ansari submitted did the supreme court the data revealing that 2556 MLAs and MPs in 2020 were accused of criminal charges in the past and the number rises to 4442 by including the former MPs and MLAs. These politicians are getting their powers to engage in corrupt activities and often involve in allocating public resources to private parties to enrich themselves. The election data shows that some of the politicians are even charged with grave offenses of murder, kidnapping, and rape.

Laws relating to the disqualification of convicted politicians

Earlier, the convicted politicians held on to the position until they exhausted all the power in them but after the judgment of the Supreme Court of India in July 2013, MP MLA and MLC who is accused of any charges and has been imprisoned for a minimum tenure of 2 years disqualified for the membership of the house immediately. (Thomas vs Union of India ). Provisions under Section 8 (4) of the Representation Of The People Act, allowed the elected representatives who had been punished with imprisonment for more than 2 years before the judgment of the supreme court but later the bench of justice AK Patnaik and Justice S J Mukhopadhyay declared it unconstitutional.

Section 4A of the conduct of election rules 1961 requires the elected representative to file an affidavit including his personal information and the information of charges against him are the offenses in which he has been convicted. The punishment for providing incorrect information has been regulated by the Representation of Peoples Act under Section 125 A.

Recommendations by the Election Commission of India –

It was suggested by the election commission of India’s report on the proposed electoral reforms in the year 2004 that the punishment specified under section 125 of the representation of peoples act should be amended and aggravated for concealing for providing incorrect information. It suggested that the punishment of a fine should be replaced with imprisonment of at least two years.

It also recommended amendment of form 26 and to include in it the additional affidavit and to add a column to disclose their annual income the motive of including tax.

Another important recommendation was to insert a new section in the Act to make it mandatory to declare the assets and pending criminal cases to obtain membership to the houses.

Case law

In the case of Rambabu Singh Thakur vs Sunil Arora, Supreme Court ordered the political party to publish the previous criminal records of their candidate on the official party website, social media, or any National/local newspaper within 48 hours with an explanation regarding why the candidate with criminal records has been chosen over other candidates.

Conclusion-

The political parties allowing the politicians with criminal antecedents threatens the stability of the Indian democracy. The first thing a politician with criminal antecedent does after securing the seat is dropping off all the criminal charges against him. It should be made sure that no case shall be withdrawn against any elected legislature without a relevant decree.