Rape accused were given party ticket for six Parliamentary seats, 27 Assembly seats in last 5 years

[jairamesh]

'By fielding rape accused, parties are abetting crime' http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/by-fielding-rape-accused-parties-are-abetting-crime/article4222945.ece

With political parties in the last five years giving Lok Sabha election ticket to six persons and State election ticket to 27 persons, who declared that they were charged with rape and six MLAs with rape cases now actually representing people in the Assemblies a demand has been raised that the practice of fielding people with criminal backgrounds be stopped forthwith. It was in the backdrop of the outrage over Sunday's gang-rape in Delhi and at a time when Parliament was seized of the matter, that National Election Watch (NEW) and the Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR) "looked at the background of our lawmakers [MPs and MLAs] with respect to rape cases and other crimes against women based on their self-sworn affidavits. The national coordinator for NEW and ADR Anil Bairwal; founder member and former IIM Ahmedabad professor Jagdeep Chhokar; and member and IIM Bangalore professor Trilochan Sastry said they "found that there are several lawmakers who have similar cases pending against them as per their last affidavit declaration to the Election Commission of India. The group said that in the 2009 Lok Sabha elections, the political parties gave ticket to six persons who declared that they had been charged with rape. They included one each from the RPP, the Revolutionary Communist Party, the Bahujan Samaj Party and the Jharkhand Mukti Morcha and two Independents. During these polls, 34 other contestants declared that they had charges of crimes against women. While Parliament is debating the issue, two of its members one of the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam from Tamil Nadu and the other of the All India Trinamool Congress from West Bengal have also declared that they face charges, such as cruelty and intent to outrage a woman's modesty. The situation in the State elections is even worse. As per the report of NEW and the ADR, "six MLAs have declared that they have charges of rape against them in their sworn affidavits submitted with the Election Commission of India at the time of their election. Of these six MLAs with declared rape cases, three are of the Samajwadi Party from Uttar Pradesh; and one each is of the Bahujan Samaj Party, from U.P., of the Bharatiya Janata Party from Gujarat; and of the Telugu Desam Party from Andhra Pradesh. Of the 27 candidates who have rape cases against them and were yet given party ticket for State elections, 10 were from Uttar Pradesh and five from Bihar. Apart from these, the group said, "36 MLAs have declared that they have other charges of crimes against women such as outraging the modesty of a woman, assault, insulting the modesty of a woman registered against them. Of these, six are from the Congress, five from the BJP, and three from the Samajwadi Party. Incidentally, Uttar Pradesh has the maximum number of such MLAs at eight; followed by Orissa and West Bengal with seven MLAs each. The group said "By giving ticket to candidates who have been charged with crimes against women especially rape, political parties have been in a way abetting circumstances that lead to such events that they so easily but vehemently condemn in Parliament. It has thus demanded that "Candidates with a criminal background should be debarred from contesting elections" and "cases against MPs and MLAs should be fast-tracked and decided in a time-bound manner.

First clean up the top then the rest will follow, what hope if those accused of rapes and criminal backgrounds continue to contest elections and represent the people. It's simples...first clear your name, prove your innocence and then only can you run for office...

[jairamesh]

Of the six MLAs with declared rape cases, three are from Samajwadi Party -- Sribhagwan Sharma, Anoop Sanda and Manoj Kumar Paras. The others are Mohammed Aleem Khan of BSP, Jethabhai G Ahir of BJP and Kandikunta Venkata Prasad of TDP.

[DomainK]

One should also think if a man "accused" of a crime should be stopped from fighting elections or from holding an official position in the government. Because "accusing" someone of something is very easy and once you have that law or practice in, any deserving candidate can be stopped from fighting an election by merely "accusing" him of a crime a few days before the elections. Then it will become a game of who can arrange more accusations.

[Raghav_12]

One should also think if a man "accused" of a crime should be stopped from fighting elections or from holding an official position in the government. Because "accusing" someone of something is very easy and once you have that law or practice in, any deserving candidate can be stopped from fighting an election by merely "accusing" him of a crime a few days before the elections. Then it will become a game of who can arrange more accusations.

Totally Agreed.. Some of these articles just make no sense and are written with only motive of grabbing some eyeballs without showing any kind of understanding of the subject they are writing about. Clearly nobody should be denied any kind of rights until proven guilty. Mere accusation doesn't prove anything. The way cases are filed in India with all kind of oblique motives, it would be disastrous if people are barred from something just because they have been accused. It is sad state of affairs that around 70-75% prisoners of India are under-trial while only around 25% are convicted ones. Many of these under-trials go on to be declared as non-guilty in court of law. In European countries or in US, any kind of imprisonment without a conviction of court has to be explained very clearly. Clear mandate in these countries is that, put person behind bars only if he has been proven guilty conclusively and from all level of courts where an accused can file an appeal. I don't have numbers for ratio between under-trials and convicted for prisoners of these countries but it should be complete opposite to what India has. Isn't it clear violation of human rights that so many under-trails are kept behind bars in India?