Poll panel seeks to fine candidates who contest and win from 2 seats

NEW DELHI: The Election Commission (EC) wants to discourage candidates from contesting from multiple constituencies, and has proposed a fine for lawmakers who fight from two seats and win both, documents accessed by HT show.

Under India’s election laws, if a legislator wins their election from two seats, they have to vacate one of the two seats, where a by-election has to be held within six months. The proposal – which was submitted to the Union law ministry a few weeks ago – said that members of state assemblies who successfully contest from two seats and vacate one later will have to pay ₹5 lakh. For parliamentarians, this figure is ₹10 lakh, documents show.

rationale behind the fine was to make the lawmaker bear some of the cost of the bypoll necessitated by their decision to fight from two seats, a person familiar with the matter said.

“When a candidate contests from two seats, it is imperative that he has to vacate one of the two seats, should he win both. This, apart from the consequent unavoidable financial burden on the public exchequer and the manpower and other resources for holding the by-election against the resultant vacancy, would be an injustice to voters of the constituency, which the candidate is quitting from,” said the person quoted above, requesting anonymity.

The proposal was part of a raft of reforms, which includes a twoyear imprisonment term for candidates filing false affidavits. In a recently-held meeting, chief election commissioner Rajiv Kumar, who took over last month, and election commissioner Anup Chandra Pandey asked the law ministry to expedite the reforms.

While the EC can propose the reforms, the final approval is given by the government which may have to introduce amendments in Parliament so as to update the Representation of the People Act, 1951.

“The reform was first proposed in 2004 to amend the existing laws to reflect the same, if a candidate contests from two constituencies they should bear the cost of the by-election to the seat that the contestant decides to vacate,” said the person quoted in the first instance.

Indian politicians often contest from multiple seats, either as a matter of security or to spread their political influence. In the 2014 general election, Prime Minthe ister Narendra Modi contested from Vadodara and Varanasi, later vacating the former. In 2019, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi fought from Wayanad in Kerala and Amethi in UP but lost the latter.

It was in 1996 that an amendment to the Representation of the People Act restricted the number of seats to two that a candidate can contest in one election. EC also sought the power to de-register political parties, so that it can control tax evasion by parties that are not contesting polls. Jagdeep Chhokar from the Association Democratic Reforms, said contestants should not be allowed to fight from two seats but expressed doubt on whether the fine was an adequate deterrent. “The fines of ₹10 lakh and ₹5 lakh are arbitrary and do not seem to have a relationship with expenses incurred,” he said.