New Delhi, February 15
An all-party meeting, convened by the Election Commission today, failed to evolve a consensus on the state funding of election, which is aimed at curbing money power in elections.
While the parties conceptually agreed to state funding of the election, they differed on the details of the proposals sent by the Union Cabinet in December.
The implication of the state funding of elections would mean increased burden on the tax payers as there are 543 parliamentary constituencies and several hundred Assembly seats.
The 10-point proposals, however, do not indicate that the state funding would put an end to corporate funding to political parties and candidates for their own pecuniary benefits.
Chief Election Commissioner B.B. Tandon, however, said a near consensus was reached on two broad aspects strictly enforcing the limit of Rs 25 lakh on election expenditure for a Lok Sabha candidate and Rs 10 lakh on an Assembly candidate, and restricting expenditures of political parties on which there was no limit now.
The CEC said while there was a broad agreement on the 50:50 sharing of corpus fund between the Centre and the states, some regional parties favoured that the Centre’s share be enhanced to 75 per cent.
Mr Tandon said the commission had asked the parties to file their written submissions within a week so as to formulate its views before forwarding its recommendations to the government.
The poll panel would now send its recommendations to the Centre, which would deliberate on the issue and come out with a suitable legislation. The commission’s earlier recommendation on electoral reforms, which is aimed at curbing politician-criminal nexus, is still pending with the government.
“We are not in favour of the proposal in the present form” CPM leader Nilotpal Basu said, adding that the partial funding would only act as a subsidy to those political parties which were actually
spending huge sum and would ultimately be a “drag” on the exchequer.Leader of the CPI D. Raja, however, said it was a good proposal and the state funding should fall within the present limit of Rs 25 lakh for a Lok Sabha seat and Rs 10 lakh for an Assembly seat.
On the issue of fixing the limit of expenditure of candidates, Congress favoured that the parties should be allowed to spend more on the candidates while the BJP opposed the Congress suggestion saying that there should be a level-playing field.
Congress spokesman Abhishek Singhvi, while lauding the initiative, said the fund should be given through the political parties and not directly to the candidates and the parties should be given a free hand on the allocation.
He suggested that the fund should be proportionate to the average votes polled by the party in the last three elections. If a political party wanted to spend more, it should be allowed to do so, he added.
However, in sharp contract, BJP leader Vijay Kumar Malhotra opposed the idea that a political party be allowed to spend more on candidates, saying that it would not ensure a level-playing field.
“There should be no other funding except the state funding”, he said.
He favoured that the Model Code of Conduct should have a legal sanction to enforce the limit effectively.
Mr Sukhdev Singh Dhindsa of the SAD said political parties and candidates spent more than the stipulated limit. He said there should be strict implementation of the guidelines and the powers of the Election Commission in this regard should be strengthened.
DMK leader C. Kuppuswami said the proposal was not comprehensive. The NCP favoured a level-playing field, saying that partial funding would not solve the problem. Ramgopal Yadav (SP) suggested ceiling on political parties spending and not on candidates alone.
