On the other hand, 14% of the Rajya Sabha MPs – 31 in total – are billionaires, the report highlights.
It states that one Rajya Sabha MP has declared a case related to murder (Section 302 of IPC), four have declared cases related to attempt to murder (Section 307 of IPC) and three sitting MPs have declared cases related to crime against women.
The data shared by the ADR is based on the analysis of affidavits of 229 out of 233 Rajya Sabha MPs. The affidavits of three Rajya Sabha MPs were unavailable, and a seat from Jharkhand is currently vacant. The new analysis also includes 37 recently elected members of the Rajya Sabha.
What to know?
Among the 229 affidavits of sitting Rajya Sabha MPs, ADR found that 73 or 32% have declared criminal cases, while 36 (16%) of them are currently facing serious charges against them.
A party-wise analysis shows that 27 MPs who have declared criminal cases against them belong to the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which has 99 seats.
On the other hand, 12 of the 28 Congress MPs, four of 13 MPs from TMC, and four of 10 AAP MPs have declared criminal cases. Among others who have disclosed criminal cases are three MPs from CPI(M) and BRS each, as well as two each from DMK, YSRCP, AIADMK, Samajwadi Party and RJD.
Among those with serious criminal cases are 13 from the BJP, seven from Congress, and two each from the TMC, AAP and CPI(M). At least an MP each from BRS, DMK, YSRCP, AIADMK and Samajwadi Party have similar charges.
‘Billionaires’
The ADR report highlights that 31 MPs (or 14%) have a net worth of over a billion.
A party-wise comparison shows that six from BJP, five from Congress, four from YSRCP, two each from AAP and BRS, as well as three from NCP, have declared assets exceeding ₹100 crore.
It may be noted that the average assets of a Rajya Sabha MP stand at ₹120.69 crore.
The overall analysis shows that 97 (or 42%) sitting Rajya Sabha MPs have declared assets of ₹10 crore and above, 40 (17%) between ₹5 crore to ₹10 crore, 69 (30%) between ₹1 crore to ₹5 crore, 17 (8%) between ₹20 lakh to ₹1 crore and six (3%) with less than ₹20 lakhs.
The average assets per MP stand at ₹28.29 crore for the BJP, ₹128.61 crore for Congress, ₹17.70 crore for TMC, ₹574.09 crore for AAP, ₹522.63 crore for YSRCP, ₹399.71 crore for Samajwadi Party, ₹105.63 crore for BJD, and ₹11.90 crore for DMK.
BRS MP Bandi Partha Saradhi is the richest among all as he has declared assets at over ₹5,300 crore. Following him is AAP’s Rajinder Gupta, with over ₹5,053 crore, and YSRCP’s Alla Ayodhya Rami Reddy with more than ₹2,577 crore.
The poorest Rajya Sabha MP is AAP’s Sant Balbir Singh, with assets worth about ₹3 lakh. He is followed by Maharaja Sanajaoba Leishemba of Manipur with around ₹5 lakh, and Prakash Chik Baraik of TMC with around ₹9 lakh.
