pune the average assets of each of the 1326 mps and mlas elected between 2004 and 2023 in maharashtra were rs 106 crore with forty of them rich enough to be rupee billionairesan analysis of the mps and mlas elected in this period showed that 715 more than 50 have criminal cases with 422 candidates involved in serious criminal offences the association for democratic reforms adr a body of professors economists and academicians from prominent institutes that conducts election watches and the maharashtra election watch released a report on friday of an analysis of 14117 candidates in maharashtra who contested the elections and those who were elected during the two decades starting from 2004 in the assembly lok sabha elections and the bypolls the members of adr including its cofounder ajit ranade stated that an act to bar tainted individuals from contesting elections was the need of the hour considering the pattern of candidates contesting and winning elections in the last two decades studied by the group ranade is also the vicechancellor of gokhale institute of politics and economics in pune the report also said that the number of elected candidates having maximum criminal cases came from bjp with 227 representatives who declared their criminal backgrounds followed by shiv sena with 200 such candidates in two decades candidates using fake news to increase their popularitybjp scored over other parties with rs 1439 crore as average assets among their elected candidates of these 10 were rupee billionairesranade said the purpose of this detailed analysis is to keep the voters informed about the backgrounds of the candidates contesting elections and make an informed choice creating voter awareness about candidates we feel is of prime importance so that we see the best candidates in the fray he addedthe adr team felt that money power and muscle power have a large bearing on the outcome of the election resultslately along with money and muscle it is also the media presence of candidates that is contributing largely these days fake news hate speech and other such tactics are used as gimmicks to increase popularity by candidates ranade addedthe analysis shows 227 of the 386 mps and mlas elected on bjp tickets since 2004 have declared criminal cases against themselves whereas 95 of the 267 representatives elected on congress tickets since 2004 200 of 283 shiv sena representatives 107 out of 250 ncp representatives and 41 of 63 independents have declared their criminal casesstate coordinator of maharashtra election watch sharad kumar said voters should be aware that there is also a nota option during polls and they should exercise it after carefully studying the background of the candidatesthe onus is on the voters to choose if parties do not take the right step voters definitely have the option he saidhe added if nota wins the election commission will have to conduct the elections again it means that the parties will have to field able candidatesthe study also found the correlation between criminal cases declared by candidates