While Madhya Pradesh would go for polling in six constituencies on April 29, Association of Democratic Reforms (ADR) has found that there are millionaire candidates besides several who have criminal cases against them and couple of them are also illiterate.
The ADR, which has studied the details of 104 candidates had deduced that the contest in first phase has crorepati, tainted and illiterate candidates as well.
The poll arena is packed with crorepati candidates and top three of them belong to Congress. Nakul, son of Chief Minister Kamal Nath and a candidate from Chhindwara, owns a fortune of Rs 660 crore while eminent lawyer and the Rajya Sabha member Vivek Tankha who is contesting from Jabalpur has assets worth Rs 66 crore while former Leader of Opposition Ajay Singh has belongings worth Rs 37 crore.
BJP state president Rakesh Singh has assets worth over Rs 4 crore.
Tankha tops the chart in terms of annual income as his latest ITR has put his income at Rs 11 crore and surprisingly the billionaire Nakul Nath has reported an annual income of Rs two crore.
Among these millionaires, there are some candidates who come from a very humble background and one of them, Lallan Kumar from Sidhi has belongings of Rs 1,823, and is the poorest of them all in the fray for the first phase of polling in Madhya Pradesh.
Another candidate Ram Sahay from Sidhi has assets worth Rs 6,134 and Rs 10,300 is the value of assets owned by Dhanuk, a candidate from Jabalpur.
Out of the 104 candidates analysed by the ADR, 14 per cent have reported criminal cases while 8 per cent have admitted that there are cases of serious offences registered against them.
A total of 17 per cent Congress candidates have declared criminal cases against them while none of the BJP candidates in the fray in first phase has any criminal case lodged against them.
Among these former MLA Kankar Munjare who is contesting this time on BSP ticket at Balaghat carries various criminal charges against him including case of attempt to murder, wrongful confinement and rioting.
Congress leader Ajay Singh also has cases including rioting, defamation and others against him. BJP State head Rakesh Singh also has several cases against him which mostly deal with rioting and unlawful assembly.