PUNJAB POLL 2022: 25 per cent candidates in fray have criminal cases in Patiala district

Tribune News Service

Ravneet Singh

Patiala, February 10

One-fourth of the candidates in fray in eight Assembly segments of the Patiala district have mentioned criminal cases registered against them in their affidavits submitted to the district election officer. A total of 102 candidates are in the fray for the eight Assembly constituencies of the district, out of which 26 candidates have criminal cases.

As a silver lining, not even a single candidate in Shutrana and Ghanaur constituencies has a criminal case. Nine candidates are in the fray for the Shutrana seat, while 10 are contesting on the Ghanaur seat. These include Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) candidate Prem Singh Chandumajra, Madan Lal Jalalpur of the Congress and Gurlal Singh of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) in the Ghanaur constituency, while Darbara Singh of the Congress, Kulwant Singh of the AAP and Vaninder Kaur Loomba of the SAD from the Shutrana constituency.

In the Patiala Rural constituency, the maximum number of (19) candidates are in the fray. Six candidates from the constituency, including three Independents, SAD (Amritsar) chief Simranjit Singh Mann, AAP and Peoples Party of India (Democratic) candidates have criminal cases.

Seventeen candidates are in the fray for the Patiala Urban constituency. Majority of the candidates (two Independents, Lok Insaf Party, AAP, Punjab Lok Congress, SAD and SAD (Mann) have criminal cases registered against them.

In Sanaur two candidates, Rajpura three, Samana four and Nabha five have submitted information to the election office regarding cases against them. Candidates of the Congress, AAP and SAD are contesting on all eight seats in the district. Not even a single candidate of the Congress has a pending case, while six candidate of the AAP and four of the SAD, have cases registered against them.

Patiala Congress urban president Narinder Pal Verma (Lalli) said, “Our party has a clean image. Leaders do not involve in any such activity that may harm the party’s reputation.”

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