SC fines parties for candidates' criminal records, says they refuse to wake up from deep slumber

The parties "refuse to wake up from deep slumber", the Supreme Court said while imposing the fines.

The Congress, BJP and five more parties were fined Rs. 1 lakh each and the CPM and Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) were fined Rs. 5 lakh for not making public their candidates' criminal cases ahead of the Bihar election in November last year.

Every political party needs to publicly declare the criminal records of their candidates within 48 hours of their selection.

The court's verdict observed that 51 per cent of the winning candidates in Bihar have serious criminal cases lodged against them including murder, kidnapping and rape.

The apex court did acknowledge the possibility of rivals implicating someone falsely as vendetta.

"Despite repeated appeals, political parties refuse to wake up from deep slumber," said the Supreme Court.

"Political lawmakers will wake up soon and carry out major surgery for weeding out the malignancy of criminalisation of politics," the court noted in its order.

The Supreme Court's appeals had "fallen on deaf ears", said Justices RF Nariman and BR Gavi.

"Though we want to do something urgently, our hands are tied, we can't encroach on the domain of legislature," they remarked.

The judges have warned political parties to not indulge in such practice in future elections. The parties have been asked to publish such information on their websites.

The Election Commission has been asked to create a mobile app that has the information for voters to access easily.

To stop state governments from misusing their powers, the apex court also said criminal cases against MLAs or MPs cannot be withdrawn without approval from High Courts.

The observations were made while hearing petitions that call for suspending symbols of parties that had failed to disclose the criminal backgrounds of their candidates.