Will Hira Sarania advertise criminal cases as per new Election Commission guidelines?

Guwahati, March 15, 2019:

Since the Election Commission has made it compulsory for candidates contesting the Lok Sabha elections to ‘advertise’ their criminal records in TV and newspapers at least three times, it would seem that newspapers and electronic media will be full of ads proclaiming the ‘dirty deeds’ of politicians. Now a question that arises is whether Kokrajhar Lok Sabha MP, who has had several cases filed against him, advertise the cases on media?

As per a list compiled by NGO National Election Watch, the militant-turned-MP has an impressive number of cases lodged against him. Three cases with 9 serious IPC have been registered.

The brief details of IPCs are:

- 2 charges related to kidnapping or abducting in order to murder (IPC Section-364)

- 2 charges related to murder (IPC Section – 302)

- 2 charges related to Causing disappearance of evidence of offense, or giving false information to screen offender (IPC Section – 201)

- 1 charge related to Kidnapping for ransom, etc. (IPC Section – 364A)

- 1 charge related to dacoity with murder (IPC Section – 396)

- 1 charge related to dishonestly receiving property stolen in the commission of a dacoity (IPC Section-412)

- 1 charge related to punishment of criminal conspiracy (IPC Section-120B_

- 1 charge related to Acts done by several persons in furtherance of common intention (IPC Section-34)

Phew, those are quite a lot of allegations and it seems like the sitting Kokrajhar MP will have to spend quite a lot of money on advertising if he wishes to contest the seat again. It is to be mentioned that Naba (Hira) Sarania was the Commander of the 709 battalion of proscribed militant outfit ULFA. He won the 2014 election from Kokrajhar Constituency as an independent candidate.

Meanwhile, National Election Watch state coordinator and founder of North East social trust Tasaduk Ariful Hussain has stressed that these lists, which expose the background of the political candidates are important. Speaking exclusively to InsideNE, he said: “We have been doing this since 2002-03. The basic purpose of our work is to reduce the muscle and money power from the political system of India. We don’t want someone who has allegations of raping girls to make policies for women in the country. We don’t want a corrupt person to make laws against corruption.”