98 Bihar MLAs have serious criminal charges against them

Bihar has more MLAs with serious criminal charges in the Assembly this time compared to 2010 with the number of such leaders seeing a rise from 76 to 98.

Same is the case with affluent MLAs with an analysis showing that two-thirds of MLAs were crorepatis, a quantum jump from 45 to 162.

According to private election watchdog Association for Democratic Rights (ADR), 40 per cent or 98 out of 243 MLAs have serious criminal charges like murder. Of the 228 MLAs analysed during 2010 polls, 76 or 33 per cent MLAs had declared serious criminal cases.

The RJD has the highest number of such MLAs – 34 (43 per cent) of 80, followed by the JD(U) with 28 (39 per cent) of 71. Thirty-six per cent or 19 of the 53 MLAs from the BJP and 11 (41 per cent) of the 27 Congress lawmakers have serious charges against them.

Two MLAs of CPI(ML)(L) and one each MLA of LJP and Rashtriya Lok Samata Party are also in this group.

The analysis showed that 11 MLAs, including four from RJD, have declared cases related to murder while 29 have declared cases related to attempt to murder.

Three MLAs have declared cases related to crimes against women. Gulab Yadav, RJD MLA from Jhanjharpur, has declared a case of rape against him while another was charged for causing miscarriage without woman’s consent.

Money matters
On the wealth front, 162 or 66.66 per cent of the MLAs are crorepatis. The figure was 45 (20 per cent) in 2010. The richest among them was Poonam Devi Yadav (JD-U) from Khagaria with Rs 41.34-crore assets.

Ajeet Sharma, Congress' Bhagalpur MLA, was second among the richest with Rs 40.57 crore followed by Anant Kumar Singh, Independent MLA from Mojama with Rs 28 crore.

The RJD has 51 crorepati MLAs while JD(U) has 53, BJP 32 and Congress 19. The average of assets per MLA who won in the 2015 Assembly elections is Rs 3.02 crore while the average asset for each candidate who contested is Rs 1.44 crores. In 2010, the average assets per MLA were Rs 82.46 lakh. An analysis of 80 re-elected MLAs showed that their average assets were valued at Rs 3.04 crore while it was Rs 1.05 crore in 2010. The average growth in assets of re-elected MLAs from 2010 to 2015 is Rs 1.98 crores, which is an increase of 188 per cent.