NEW DELHI: It’s no secret that money and liquor flow freely every election season. This time, a new record appears set to be made.
In the first 15 days of the announcement of poll schedule, enforcement agencies have seized nearly 50 per cent of the total cash seized in the 2014 general elections and an almost equivalent amount of liquor.
Cash amounting to Rs 143 crore was seized from March 11 to 25, whereas in 2014 a total amount of Rs 300 crore was seized during the entire period when the Model Code of Conduct (MCC) was in force.
Similarly, liquor worth Rs 92 crore was seized during the last elections while this time, liquor worth Rs 90 crore has already been recovered. Overall, the agencies have seized suspect cash, illegal liquor and drugs worth about Rs 540 crore since the election schedule was announced on March 10.
Use of unaccounted money during the election period is an open secret. Keeping this in view, the poll body last week appointed two retired Indian Revenue Service (Income Tax) officers as special expenditure observers for Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu. This is the first time that such observers have been appointed for any election in the country.
During a meeting of observes on Tuesday, CEC Sunil Arora said the poll panel is considering appointing a few more Special Expenditure Observers (SEOs) in more ‘Expenditure Sensitive States’ to monitor illegal cash and inducements being given to voters. The EC has identified about 120 expenditure sensitive constituencies.
To deal with the challenging of curbing the use of black money, the EC has put in place a proper mechanism.
“Deployment of Flying Squads and Static Surveillance Teams has been made to keep vigil over movement of cash linked with candidates or political parties, or items of bribe meant for inducement of electors, liquor and other illicit items during elections and their seizure has been made,” said an official.