RAMBABU SINGH THAKUR Vs. SUNIL ARORA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This contempt petition raises grave issues regarding the criminalisation of politics in India and brings to our attention a disregard of the directions of a Constitution Bench of this Court in Public Interest Foundation and Ors. v. Union of India and Anr. (2019) 3 SCC 224.

(2.) In this judgment, this Court was cognisant of the increasing criminalisation of politics in India and the lack of information about such criminalisation amongst the citizenry. In order to remedy this information gap, this Court issued the following directions:

(3.) On a perusal of the documents placed on record and after submissions of counsel, it appears that over the last four general elections, there has been an alarming increase in the incidence of criminals in politics. In 2004, 24% of the Members of Parliament had criminal cases pending against them; in 2009, that went up to 30%; in 2014 to 34%; and in 2019 as many as 43% of MPs had criminal cases pending against them.