Chief Electoral Officer Rajat Kumar has underlined the need for bringing in financial regulation among the political parties to curb the flow of money during elections.
“Bringing in financial regulation among the political parties will go a long way in checking use of cash during poll process,” Mr. Rajat Kumar said.
Responding to queries during a Meet-the-press programme organised by the Hyderabad Press Club here on Monday, he said the conviction rate of offenders caught indulging in malpractices in the elections was on the lower side, around 35 per cent, and this was because of the internal resolutions and compromises reached between them and the complainants.
The CEO said the enforcement officials seized cash and other items worth over ₹112 crore, much higher than ₹76 crore seized during the total election period in 2014 in the united AP. Several steps had been initiated including bringing down ceiling of daily cash expenses from ₹20,000 to ₹10,000. “Use of money is definitely going up and there is no denying that. It is a general malice and several measures have been put in place to check this.”
Mr. Rajat Kumar said conduct of elections in Telangana had been a bit more challenging as the polls had been advanced after the dissolution of the Legislative Assembly.
Several firsts
Telangana had witnessed several firsts in the conduct of the current elections, including the end-to-end work done on the ERO Net for enrolment of voters and introduction of voter verifiable paper audit trail machines. In addition, parties were asked to submit their manifestos along with self-declarations so that the commission could check whether the promises made were for public good and were not aimed at inducing voters. Replying to queries on whether the manifestos were being scrutinised, he said the election authority was not having sufficient machinery to scrutinise all the documents and would therefore rely upon the declaration given by the parties/candidates. “Voters can lodge an election petition within 45 days after the completion of the poll process,” he said.
The election authority this time around was carefully monitoring the “paid news” constituting special teams to check whether the parties were resorting to paid campaign in the disguise of news. To another query on doubts over the veracity of the EVMs, he said efforts had been initiated to ensure that there was no human error in the functioning of the EVMs.
