Farce in store on actual poll spend

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The poll spend cap of Rs 28 lakh fixed by the Election Commission for an Assembly candidate this time will be observed more in breach by nominees of main parties, in a farcical repeat of deliberate under-reporting of individual election expenses. The Election Commission has a stringent assessment mechanism to monitor the election expenses but parties have been too clever to mobilize funds well ahead of the declaration of elections and mastered the art of cheating the EC.

In Kerala, hectic funds mobilization drives by party leaders take place well before the poll announcement. They make a beeline to the Gulf to tap the Malayalee expats. It is nothing new. In the 2011 Assembly polls, the EC official traced nearly Rs 75 lakh in three tranches, , funneled through an SB account of a prominent NRK bizman, to three different parties in Kochi. Sums were mobilized in the Gulf well before the announcement of elections and entrusted with the NRK, who deposited it in his SB account. Disbursals in Kochi were made from this account but the EC official could not prosecute the case owing to political pressure.

Association for Democratic Reforms State coordinator T Ravindran says it is intriguing why the information garnered by an elaborate EC monitoring network, which includes three flying squads to each constituency, goes to waste. The question is why the EC has not instituted a mechanism to re-check the poll spend submitted by MLAs in 2011. Most of them under-reported, submitting accounts for an average spent Rs 10 lakh, roughly 50 percent of the EC cap of Rs 18 lakh.

Candidates deliberately keep a margin to provide for expenses detected on the shadow register, which is tracked by the EC. The EC sets up a shadow register for every candidate. All candidates are bound to accept donations in excess of Rs 20,000 only by cheque. This time the EC is drafting a panel of chartered accountants to facilitate smooth filing of poll expenses. Agencies like the ADR are hamstrung in prosecuting the corrupt because the EC has fixed two months from the poll date for the filing of election complaint. The candidate exhausts 45 days to file the statement of expenses, leaving 15 days only for those who want to source details through RTI and file a complaint.

Sources say the average poll spend this time in an Assembly constituency should be more than Rs 1.5 core.  Only expenses on posters, taxi cabs and adverts would be listed. All enticements are illegal and therefore not reported. EC officials however maintained that micro-analysis of poll expenses was not practical. There has to be a convergence of the concerned citizen, the party worker and the candidate to ensure greater electoral accountability. For now, till the poll spend fraud is reined in, the EC spends more time on ensuring peaceful polling across polling booths, especially those in Kannur, listed as hypersensitive.