18 per cent election candidates are crorepatis, finds Election Watch

Thiruvananthapuram: The Election Watch (EW) has come out with statistics that 18 per cent of the candidates contesting the elections are crorepatis. Election Watch State Co-ordinator T. Ravindran said that out of the 1,125 candidates, 202 (18%) are crorepatis. The party wise analysis of crorepatis showed that the highest number of crorepatis is from Congress with 43 out of 85 candidates which came to around 51 per cent of the candidates.

As many as 24 (29 percent) out of 84 candidates from CPM, 18 (19 per cent) out of 97 candidates from BJP, 18(50 per cent) out of 36 candidates from Bharath Dharma Jana Sena, two (29 per cent) out of 7 candidates from AIADMK, 17 (74 per cent) out of 23 candidates from IUML, 9 (60 per cent) out of 15 candidates from Kerala Congress (M)and 30 (eight per cent) out of 387 independent candidates have declared assets worth Rs 1 crore and above in their affidavits.

Among major parties, the average assets per candidate for 85 Congress candidates are Rs 1.83 crore, while 97 BJP candidates have average assets of Rs 1.03 crores. All the 84 CPM candidates’ together have average assets worth Rs 1.51 crore.

The average assets of seven AIADMK candidates together are Rs 35.14 crore, while 36 Bharath Dharma Jana Sena candidates have average assets worth Rs 3.19 crore. All the 25 candidates of the CPI candidates put together have average assets worth Rs 71.16 lakhs. Average assets of 23 IUML candidates are Rs 4.21 crore, and that of 15 Kerala Congress (M) candidates have average assets of Rs 3.16 crore.

The average assets of seven JD (U) candidates were Rs 5.25 crore, while five JD(S) candidates have average assets of Rs 4.59 crore. The average assets of 387 Independent candidates were Rs. 43.87 Lakhs.