BJP and NCP Candidates, Mr Somaiya
and Mr Patil in NE Mumbai
Reprimamded for illegal concealment
of expenses worth 28lakhs
Violation of law and code of conduct
can have serious repercussions
The just concluded Lok Sabha
Elections were characterized by the excessive use of money power by the two
main parties – BJP and the Congress and their alliance partners.
The election commission had increased
the candidate’s spending limit to Rs.70 lakhs and allowed the parties to spend
any amount without restriction as long as these expenses were for the benefit
of the party in general and not for the benefit of any particular candidate. This
itself has brought in unjustifiable disparity with no level playing field
amongst the candidates and the parties. Inspite of the increased limits,
candidates have been spending far more than the allowed limit and disguising
the expenses as party expenses making a mockery of the spending limit fixed by
the Election commission. One would remember Mr Gopinath Munde’s public
confession about his having spent not less than Rs 8 crores just for MLA
constituency.
One such example of excessive
spending by the two main parties was the distribution of plastic laminated
Voter ID cards to all the voters of the Mumbai North East and other
constituencies. The laminated cards were in violation of the Model Code of
Conduct which specified that the voter slips should be on plain white paper and
should not contain the name of any party or candidate or symbol. The cards
distributed by these parties had the name of the parties, symbols, pictures of
leaders and candidates and slogans on them.
Medha Patkar, candidate of AAP from
Mumbai North East, through her election agent, Mr Anil Hebbar had filed a
complaint to the Returning Officer (RO) that the distribution of these Voter ID
cards are illegal and the expenses incurred on them should be included in the
election expenditure of the candidates concerned as it was primarily meant for
bettering their election prospects. After they were issued notices by the RO
both the parties and the candidates, Mr Kirit Somaiya (BJP) and Mr Sanjay Dina
Patil (NCP) justified the distribution of cards and gave number of fictitious
reasons and unjustifiably low expenses on the same. While Mr Somaiya claimed
having printed only 4,76,401 cards @ 80 paise,
expenses totaling Rs 4,00,429.20/- ; Mr Patil claimed 2,00,000 cards @
50 paise amounting to Rs 1,05,000/- only
The RO after a thorough investigation
has passed his order dated 23/04/2014 which was not forwarded to us until
yesterday. The order has concluded the above mentioned claims to be false and
rejected those. The RO has instructed the BJP candidate Mr.Kirit Somaiya to add
Rs.20,25,979/-(Twenty lakhs twenty five thousand nine hundred and seventy nine)
and the NCP candidate Mr,Sanjay Dina Patil to add Rs.8,10,000/-(Eight lakhs ten
thousand) to the candidate’s election expenses account. This is based on the
candidate’s own admission of the number of copies printed, which in BJP’s case
was 4 lakhs and NCP’s case was 2 lakhs.
Even though our investigation shows that the number of copies printed
was far more as there are about 17 lakh voters in the constituency, benefit of
doubt was given to the candidates by the RO as proving the actual figure printed in the
short time available was a difficult job. However we as AAP will surely bring
out the truth in the course of time. We also assert that printing and
distribution of such cards itself is violation of the law committed by both the
parties.
The answers given by both the
candidates to the query of the RO are really revealing and show the extent to
which the so called national parties go to break the Model Code of Conduct and
hide the actual expenditure incurred, by concealing facts which amounts to
lying.
·
We have also
filed a complaint on the huge money spent by the BJP on hoardings within the North
East Mumbai constituency and the suppression of actual expenditure incurred
there in. Mr Somaiya himself has 8 hoardings for his own candidature (list
enclosed) which would amount to expenses worth tens of lakhs of rupees. The RO
is yet to take a decision on this. Any expenditure above the permitted limit
can lead to disqualification of the candidate.
While section 126 of Representation
of Peoples Act prevents candidates from carrying on any campaigning 48 hours
before the close of poll, it is ironic that the major parties spend Crores of
Rupees on front page advertisements even on the day of poll. This totally
negates the spirit of providing a level playing field for all candidates and
allows major parties with unknown sources of income to manufacture their
images. We regret that no action has been taken by any authority or the court
on this till date and hence will pursue the matter with the election commission
of India
in due course.
·
On the other hand
it is regrettable and shocking that one of our opponents Mr Patil NCP has
complained with the RO about some paid news in The Urdu Times which was
actually a news circulated by the federation of minorities NGOs, Maharashtra.
They have refuted the same through a statement issued today.
We as AAP feel extremely anguished that
the election commission of India
is taken for a ride by the mainstream parties who take pride in falsely
claiming themselves to be capable of good governance. Can the violators of law
ever provide good governance? Can the election and the results based on such
campaigns of falsehood be considered as free and fair?
We expect ECI to take a storng
postion in the above matter and give the final verdict at the earliest.
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