In an unprecedented order to check criminalisation of politics, the Supreme Court held nine political parties including the ruling BJP and JD (U) in Bihar guilty of contempt and fined eight of them for violating its February, 2020 order on publication of criminal antecedents of their candidates for the assembly polls.
The top court also modified its earlier order to make it clear that political parties must publish the criminal antecedents of their candidates, if any, within 48 hours of their selection, as it lamented the apathy of the government’s legislative wing in not taking steps to decriminalise the political system and that political parties refuse to wake up from “deep slumber”.
Maintaining that persons with criminal antecedents and involved in criminalisation of politics cannot be permitted to be law-makers, the apex court said it can only appeal to the “conscience” of lawmakers and hope they will wake up soon and carry out a “major surgery” for weeding out the malignancy of criminalisation in politics.
“The nation continues to wait, and is losing patience. Cleansing the polluted stream of politics is obviously not one of the immediate pressing concerns of the legislative branch of government,” a bench headed by Justice R F Nariman said in its 71-page verdict on a plea seeking contempt action against several political parties including the BJP and the Indian National Congress (INC) for non-compliance of its February 13, 2020 directions during the Bihar assembly polls. The contempt plea was filed by Brajesh Singh, a lawyer from Bihar.
The apex court directed the Election Commission of India (ECI) to create a dedicated mobile application containing information published by the candidates regarding their criminal antecedents so that voter gets information on his or her mobile phone at one stroke.
The bench, also comprising justice B R Gavai, imposed a fine of Rs five lakh each on the Communist Party of India-Marxist(CPI-M) and the Nationalist Congress Party(NCP), saying they “have not at all complied with the directions issued by this court”.
It imposed a fine of Rs one lakh each on the Janata Dal-United (JD-U), the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD), Lok Janshakti Party(LJP), INC, Bharatiya Janata Party(BJP) and the Communist Party of India (CPI) and asked them to deposit the money within eight weeks with the poll panel. The Rashtriya Lok Samta Party (RLSP) was spared of the fine.
