Chief Election Commis-sioner VS Sampath on Sunday said that there is a “crying need” for a “well-defined legislation” governing expenditure of political parties during elections.
Speaking at a session organised by the law Commission, the CEC said that the Election Commission was finding it difficult to keep check on political spending during elections as the absence of law allowed political parties and their candidates to circumvent rules with impunity.Sampath even stated that ‘paid news’ was another concern of the Commission and recommended it to be made an electoral offence. “If it is an electoral offence, it can eventually lead to the disqualification of the candidate. Whatever the difficulties of implementation, the very fact that if it is listed as electoral offence, it would act as a deterrent against people using it in the elections,” he said.
With paid news not an electoral offence, EC has failed to curb this menace by invoking its powers related to candidates' spending. He said that when candidates are caught, they have found their own way to wriggle out of it.He said that the EC catches instances of paid news but it is like “paying some traffic fine,” and after paying it they continue with their journey. Moreover, the Commission’s control over a candidate’s spending is only after he files his nomination, when in reality substantial election related expenses occur before this stage.
The CEC said that there are many complaints but "the reality is you really can't do much about these things. He noted that all limits for poll expenditure is for candidates and none for political parties.
“We have seen political parties handling huge amounts of cash. We have seen political parties giving to the candidates huge amounts of cash. When it is caught they will say no, no it is not meant for him, it is meant for him to distribute to others in his district or in his State.
“There is no regulatory framework governing these things. There is a crying need for a well defined legislation governing political parties particularly political parties’ finance,” Sampath said. He said that recently the Commission had tried to come out with some transparency guidelines. He said in countries like the US, expenditure commissions only take care of the expenditure and how political parties raise finance.
The CEC also called for a “well defined law” relating to opinion polls conducted by TV channels. “There should be a well defined law regulating opinion polls also,” the CEC said. He noted that there is a view that voters will not be swayed by opinion polls but added that that there were instances where candidates won by wafer thin margins.