TS Singhdev tops among 253 crorepati candidates
Raipur. Of the 953 candidates contesting in the second phase of Chhattisgarh assembly elections, 253 candidates are crorepatis, including Congress candidate and state Deputy Chief Minister T.S. Singhdev tops the list with assets worth more than Rs 447 crore. However, in the last assembly elections, Singhdev had declared his assets to be more than Rs 500 crore.
‘Chhattisgarh Election Watch’ and ‘Association for Democratic Reforms’ (ADR) have said in their report that there are a total of 958 candidates in the second phase, but they have not analyzed five candidates because their affidavits were either poorly scanned or or the complete affidavits were not uploaded on the Election Commission website.
According to the report released on Friday, the average assets of the candidates contesting in the second phase are Rs 2 crore. The report said that among the major parties, 60 (86 percent) of the 70 candidates of the Indian National Congress are crorepatis and 57 (81 percent) of the 70 candidates of the Bharatiya Janata Party are crorepatis. At the same time, 26 (42 percent) out of 62 candidates of Janata Congress Chhattisgarh (J) and 19 (43 percent) out of 44 candidates of Aam Aadmi Party are crorepatis.
Out of 90 assembly seats in the state, the first phase of voting was held on 20 seats on November 7 and the second phase of voting on 70 seats will be held on November 17. According to the report, the top three candidates with the highest declared assets in the state are from the ruling party Congress. T.S., a descendant of the Surguja royal family.
Singhdev is contesting from his traditional seat Ambikapur and he tops the list with assets worth over Rs 447 crore. He is followed by Ramesh Singh from Manendragarh seat (more than Rs 73 crore) and Amitesh Shukla (more than Rs 48 crore), candidate from Rajim seat. In the last assembly elections, Singhdev had declared his assets worth more than Rs 500 crore. Among the 223 candidates in the first phase of elections, Aam Aadmi Party candidate from Kawardha seat Khadgraj Singh was the candidate with the highest assets (40 crores).
