The ongoing elections to the Telangana assembly are said to be the costliest ever held in this part – both in combined Andhra Pradesh and now in separate state.
This is evident from the amount of cash seized by the police in different parts of the state in the last one and a half month as reported by the Election Commission.
Till Thursday evening, the police seized Rs 137 crore from different parts of the state. This is nearly Rs 50 crore more than the amount seized during the 2014 assembly elections in the region.
Interestingly, it is much more than what was spent on campaigning in Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh put together.
In Madhya Pradesh, which has 230 Assembly constituencies, approximately Rs 29 crore has been seized in this election, while about Rs 35 crore has been seized in Rajasthan and another Rs 20 crore in Chhattisgarh.
During 2014 general elections, an amount of Rs 331 crore was seized from across India. The undivided Andhra Pradesh accounted for Rs 153 crore of this total amount.
However, Tamil Nadu created a records of sorts in cash seizure – nearly Rs 400 crore in the 2016 assembly elections.
Officials say the amount seized in Telangana was just a tip of an iceberg. “It is not even 10 per cent of the total amount spent by the candidates in purchasing votes.
Every party is spending huge amounts to win the elections and the entire money had already reached the voters, so there is no way of catching them,” an official said.
However, is believed that the forthcoming elections in Andhra Pradesh will set a new record in election expenditure.
“In the last by-elections in Nandyal alone, there were reports that the TDP had spent more than Rs 200 crore. Imagine the expenditure in 175 assembly constituencies in AP,” the official commented.
