The State Election Commission has published a draft list of 9,202 candidates who contested in the 2020 local body elections for either failing to furnish details of their election expenses or exceeding the expense limits. They will be disqualified for a period of five years unless they furnish the information or reasons for not doing so to the officials concerned within 10 days, State Election Commissioner A. Shajahan said on Thursday.
The disqualification will apply to elections conducted to the local bodies. Elected local body members also stand to lose their membership. The local body election in the State was held on December 8, 10, and 14 in 2020. The results were declared on December 16. As per the rules, the details of the election expenses should have been submitted to the official concerned within 30 days of the declaration of results.
Disqualification
Section 33 of the Kerala Panchayat Raj Act and Section 89 of the Kerala Municipality Act empower the commission to disqualify the candidates for failing to lodge an account of their election expenses or for exceeding the prescribed limit. The commission had issued show-cause notices to candidates who had either failed to furnish the expenditure details or exceeded their limit. The draft list contains the names of the candidates who failed to comply.
The list contains 7,461 candidates who contested the elections to the three-tier panchayats, 1,297 candidates who contested in the municipality elections, and 444 candidates who contested in the elections in the corporations.
Permitted spending
The maximum spending limit in the district panchayats and corporations is fixed at ₹1.5 lakh, in the block panchayats and municipalities at ₹75,000, and in the grama panchayats, at ₹25,000.
The relevant information should be submitted to the District Collectors in the case of candidates in the district panchayats, municipalities and corporations. In the grama panchayats, the block panchayat secretary is the official concerned, while the district panchayat secretary is vested with this responsibility in the block panchayats.
In all, 74,899 candidates (38,593 men, 36,305 women and one transgender person) were in the fray for the 2020 local body elections in the State.
