Meghalaya Assembly elections 2018: 25 candidates face criminal cases, 1 charged with murder

Out of the 370 candidates contesting the Meghalaya assembly polls, twenty five have criminal cases against them. As per the self-sworn affidavits of all the candidates analysed by Meghalaya Election Watch and Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR) 21 candidates have declared serious criminal cases against themselves.

Nikman Ch.Marak, a GNC candidate has a case related to murder against himself while three other candidates have declared cases related to attempt to murder. Three candidates have declared cases related to crime against women such as rape.

Four of those candidates who have criminal cases against them are from the Bhartiya Janta Party (BJP), four are from United Democratic Party (UDP), three are from National People's Party (NPP), and 3 from Meghalaya Nationalist Congress Party (NCP). One candidate each belonging to the Congress, Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) and All India Trinamool Congress (AITC) have also listed criminal cases against them in their election affidavits.

South Tura and William Nagar have been declared red alert constituencies ie. constituencies which have three or more candidates with declared criminal cases.

The affidavits also state that 151 candidates have declared their educational qualification to be between 5th pass and 12th pass, while 208 candidates have declared having an educational qualification of graduate or above. There is 1 candidate who is literate. 244 candidates have declared their age to be between 25 and 50 years while 126 candidates are aged between 51 and 80 years.

There are 33 women candidates who are contesting the Meghalaya assembly elections this year.