A general claim on the politicians during the election would be expenses on the campaigning . It is said that an incomplete and false records are produced by almost all the serious politicians. There are a number of circumstantial evidence that would prove this. In addition to these accounting bungling, some kinds of illegal and unauthorized activities are carried out by the politicians like taking thousands of people to political rallies in buses during election by offering them money and cash being distributed to people to cast the votes.
Liberal distribution of cash by very senior politicians indicates that their accounting statements of elections are fraudulent. Election expense accounts are required to be declared under Section 77 of the Representation of the People Act, 1951. But this has been taken for granted and it is reported that five out of nine candidates do not produce the accounting details. Three of the nine do not submit accounts at all till the last date.
If the Election Commission agrees to launch an inquiry into the cases of candidates who did not lodge accounts, under section 10A of the Representation of People, the candidate would not be permitted to contest for next 3 years. False accounts should be treated as a serious criminal offence leading to imprisonment for at least six months.
Mr Seshan, the former Chief Election Commissioner indicated few cases of this claim which he has came across personally. He had been personally told by a woman candidate for the Delhi assembly elections that she had spent Rs 55 lakhs on election expenses even while stating in the mandatory government form that she spent a mere Rs 483. Another candidate for a parliamentary seat had told Seshan that he had spent Rs 50 lakhs and one Telugu candidate reportedly confided to him that he had spent 8.5 crore rupees on his elections’.
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