As many as 363 Members of Parliament and Members of Legislative Assembly (MLAs) have declared criminal cases, where the charges have been framed under Section 8(1) (2) & (3) of the Representation of the People (RP) Act, 1951.
As per a report released by the Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR) on Monday on the basis of the affidavits filed by 2495 sitting Members of Parliament (MPs), MLAs and ministers with their nomination papers between 2019 and 2021, among these 363 MPs and MLAs, 296 are MLAs and 67 are MPs.
As many as 24 sitting Lok Sabha MPs have a total of 43 criminal cases pending against them for ten years or more, 111 sitting (Members of Legislative Assembly (MLAs) have a total of 315 criminal cases pending against them for ten years or more under Section 8 (1) (2) & (3) of the RP Act, 1951.
The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has the highest number of MPs and MLAs (83), followed by the Congress (47) and All India Trinamool Congress (AITC) with 25 MPs and MLAs who have declared criminal cases where the charges have been framed the RP Act,1951.
Among the elections, Lok Sabha polls 2019 had the highest number of MPs (67), followed by Bihar Assembly election 2020 with 54 MLAs and Kerala Assembly election 2021 with 42 MLAs who have declared criminal cases where the charges have been framed under the RP Act,1951.
The ADR report said there are 39 Union ministers and ministers of state Assemblies who have declared criminal cases where the charges have been framed. Among these 39, four are Union ministers and 35 are ministers of State Assemblies.
The average number of years that criminal cases against MPs have been pending is seven years. The average number of years that criminal cases against MLAs have been pending is six years.
While 24 Lok Sabha MPs have a total of 43 criminal cases pending against them for ten years or more, 111 MLAs have a total of 315 criminal cases pending against them for ten years or more.