Around 20 per cent of the candidates contesting Lok Sabha election in Uttar Pradesh in phase 5 have criminal cases registered against them while 37 per cent are crorepatis.

Uttar Pradesh Election Watch, (UPEW) and Association for Democratic Reforms( ADR) analyzed the affidavits of all 144 candidates contesting in the fifth phase of Lok Sabha elections in UP from 14 constituencies.

The constituencies are: Lucknow, Mohanlalganj, Rae Bareli, Amethi, Jalaun, Jhansi, Hamirpur, Banda , Fahehpur, Kaushambi, Barabanki, Faizabad, Kaiserganj and Gonda.

According to the report released here on Sunday, 29 out of 144 (20 per cent ) candidates have declared criminal cases against themselves while 18 per cent of the candidates have declared serious criminal cases against themselves.

Party-wise details of candidates who have declared criminal cases against themselves are — 5 out of 14 from Bahujan Samaj Party (36per cent), 4 out of 14 from BJP (29 per cent ), 5 out of 10 from Samajwadi Party (50 per cent ), 3 out of 4 (75 per cent ) candidates of Congress and 1 out of 4 (25per cent) candidates of Apna Dal (Kemerawadi)..

A total of 29 per cent of Bahujan Samaj Party, 21 per cent of BJP, 40per cent of Samajwadi Party, 75 per cent of Congress and 25 per cent of Apna Dal (Kamerawadi) candidates have declared serious criminal cases against themselves.

Ravidas Malhotra, who is contesting from Lucknow on Samajwadi Party, has 18 criminal cases registered against him, the second candidate with criminal image is Pradeep Jain Aditya, who is the Congress candidate from Jhansi, he has six criminal cases registered against him. Bhagat Ram is at number 3, a candidate from Kaiserganj from Samajwadi Party against whom one criminal case has been registered.

The report further says that among the crorepati candidates, 53 out of 144 ie 37 per cent candidates are crorepatis which includes 13 out of 14 (93per cent) of BJP, 10 out of 10 (100per cent) of SP, 10 out of 14 (71per cent) of BSP while 4 out of 4 (100per cent) candidates of Congress.

The average assets of the candidates of the fifth phase of UP Lok Sabha elections are worth Rs. 4.37 crore. Among the main parties, the average assets of 14 candidates of BJP are around Rs 28 crore. The average assets of 14 candidates of BSP are around Rs. 5 crore. Samajwadi Party candidates’ average wealth is Rs 4 crores while 4 Congress candidates have average wealth of around Rs 9 crore.

Among the candidates for the fifth phase of Lok Sabha elections, Anurag Sharma is contesting on BJP ticket from Jhansi and has assets around Rs 212 crore while his party candidate Karan Bhushan Singh, contesting from Kaiserganj has assets of Rs 49 crore. Gonda Lok Sabha seat BJP candidate Kirtivardhan Singh has assets worth around Rs 37 crore.

State convenor of UP Election Watch, Santosh Srivastava said the top three candidates who have declared the least assets are Dharamraj, who is contesting from Hamirpur Lok Sabha seat from Al Hind Party (total assets of Rs 20,000), his party candidate Deepak Kumar Verma from Jhansi is at the second place(Rs 22,000) and at third place is Ambrish Dev Gupta, who is contesting from Bharat Mahaparivar Party from Faizabad (Rs 32,000).

In the fifth phase of Lok Sabha election, 44 out of 144 (31 per cent ) candidates have declared their educational qualification between 5th and 12th standard pass while 89 (62 per cent) have declared their educational qualification as Graduation and above. Six candidates have declared his/her educational qualification as Diploma holders. Three candidates have declared their educational qualification as literate and two candidates have declared their educational qualification as illiterate.

About the age of the candidates in the fifth phase, 49 out of 144 (34 per cent) candidates have declared their age between 25 to 40 years, while 64 (44 per cent) belong to the 41-60 year group, 31 (22 per cent) come in 61-80 years age bracket.

Only 13 (9 per cent) candidates are women in the fifth phase of Uttar Pradesh Lok Sabha elections.