Date: 06/12/2022

Relevance: GS-2: Governance and related issues, Elections and its procedure, political parties and their role in Elections.

Key Phrases: Criminalization of Politics, Election Commission of India, politics in India, Recognition of political parties, Representation of the People Act, 1951, Muscle Power, Red Tapism, Vote Bank Politics, intra-party democracy, Justice Delivery.

Context:

• There has been a consistent rise in the number of elected representatives with criminal backgrounds in Parliament and state legislatures.
• It is a matter of deep concern to all law-abiding and right-minded citizens and needs to be checked both by all political parties as well as the judiciary.

Causes of Criminalization of Politics

• Money and Muscle Power
  • Candidates with criminal records often have large hordes of cash that ensures their victory in elections.
  • Out of the 542 MPs analyzed during Lok Sabha elections in 2014, 185 (34 percent) winners had declared criminal cases, a 44% increase from 2009 Lok Sabha elections.
• Corruption and Red Tapism
  • Corruption and red-tapism in the bureaucracy and government have led to the development of a nexus between bureaucrats, politicians, police officers, criminals, and the corporates which ultimately aid the people with a criminal background to enter politics.
• Lack of Enforcement and poor Governance
  • Several laws and court judgments have not helped much, due to the lack of enforcement of laws and judgments.
• Success rate of Politicians
  • Political parties give tickets to candidates on the basis of their win ability.
  • The probability of winning for a candidate with declared criminal cases in the Lok Sabha 2019 was 15.5 percent whereas for a candidate with a clean background, it was just 4.7 percent.
• Vote bank politics and Social division of voters
  • The political parties want to win elections at any cost and they resort to polarization of voters through caste, religion based politics.
  • This creates a breeding ground for the strongmen to gain popularity and hold on the people of their own community.
• Toothless Election Commission
  • Although the Election commission has provisions of detailing of the property, cases pending in the courts, and educational qualifications from the candidates during filing the nomination papers but lacks any statutory backing to penalize or disqualify such candidates.
• Poor Conviction Rates
  • In India, the low level of conviction of MPs and MLAs and subsequent delays in the trials does not deter the political party from giving tickets to candidates with a criminal background.

Negative Impact of Criminalization of Politics

• Degrading quality of democracy polity
  • Presence of legislatures with criminal background is eating into the vitals of our democratic polity along with growing corruption of a humongous nature.
• Hijacking of state machinery and undermined good governance
  • The political control of state machinery by criminals paves way for loopholes in the legal system.
  • Good governance gets seriously undermined when, for instance, criminals, gangsters or mafia dons, become the political bosses of bureaucrats and subvert the system to serve their interests.
• A vicious cycle of obstructing the Process of Justice Delivery and criminalization of politics
  • The criminalization of politics obstructs the process of justice and causes delays in trials.
  • Criminals after getting into the position of power misuse it for or getting away with their crimes and offenses and promote persons with similar backgrounds and thus creating a vicious cycle.
• Progressively weakened state
  • This is a pervasive malaise in our body politic, which is assuming cancerous proportions and as a result the three main pillars of our democratic state get progressively weakened.
• Violence and sectarianism in the society
  • It leads to a culture of violence in society in the name of religion, caste etc. orchestrated by these criminals for their vested interests.

Decriminalization efforts

• The Vohra Committee set up by the Centre in 1993 sounded a note of warning saying that political leaders with the help of criminals first get elected to the legislatures and then protect them.
• In 2002, the Supreme Court, in Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR) v. Union of India, mandated the disclosure of information relating to criminal antecedents, educational qualification, and personal assets of a candidate contesting elections.
• In Ramesh Dalal vs. Union of India case, 2005 the Supreme Court ruled that a sitting Member of Parliament or any Member of state legislative assembly will be disqualified from contesting the election if convicted and sentenced for imprisonment for two years or more by a court of law.
• The Supreme Court in the Lily Thomas v. Union of India (2013) case, struck down as unconstitutional Section 8(4) of the Representation of the People Act that allowed convicted lawmakers a three-month period for filing appeal to the higher court and to get a stay on the conviction and sentence.
• In People’s Union for Civil Liberties v. Union of India (2013), the SC recognized negative voting as a constitutional right of a voter and directed the Government to provide the ‘NOTA’ option in electronic voting machines.
• In Public Interest Foundation and Ors. v Union of India (2014) based on recommendations made by the Law Commission in its 244th report, the SC had ordered that trials, in relation to sitting MPs and MLAs be concluded within a year of charges against them being framed.
• In 2017, the Union government started a scheme to establish 12 special courts for a year to fast track the trial of criminal cases against MPs and MLAs.

What is the way forward?

• The suggestions of the Law Commission, Supreme Court and Election Commission need to be implemented for cleansing the Parliament and state legislatures from people with a criminal background.
• The RPA Act should be amended to debar persons against whom cases of a heinous nature are pending from contesting elections.
• The Election Commission of India (ECI) should have the power to audit the financial accounts of political parties, or political parties’ finances should be brought under the right to information (RTI) law.
• State Funding of Elections is suggested by various committees (Dinesh Goswami, Inderjeet Committee) on the electoral reforms which will curb use of black money to a large extent and thereby will have a significant impact on limiting criminalization of politics.

Conclusion:

• Checking the nexus between crime, money and muscle power needs to be among the first few steps required to be taken.
• Parliament, judiciary and executive need to find common ground to put firm mechanisms in place to deal with increased criminalization of politics.
• Only a time-bound justice delivery system, firmer steps by the Election Commission of India (EC) and a proper strengthening of relevant laws can cleanse the body politic of this evil.

Source: Indian Express

Mains Question:

Q. When criminals turn into elected representatives and become law-makers, they pose a serious threat to the functioning of a democratic system. Evaluate the statement in light of the rising number of criminals in Indian politics. Also comment on the role of the judiciary in curbing the phenomenon. (250 words).