New Delhi: In an important development, the Election Commission has on Tuesday delisted another 86 'non-existent' registered unrecognised political parties, raising the number of such organisations red-flagged by the poll panel for failing to comply with electoral rules to 537.
In a statement, the EC said, "Immediate corrective measures were required to be taken in larger public interest as well as for the 'purity' of electoral democracy and hence it has also declared an additional 253 registered unrecognised political parties (RUPPs) as 'inactive'."The decision was taken by Chief Election Commissioner Rajiv Kumar and Election Commissioner Anup Chandra Pandey, it said. "The EC today further delisted 86 non-existent RUPPs and declared additional 253 as 'Inactive RUPPs'. This action against 339 non-compliant RUPPs takes the tally to 537 defaulting RUPPs since May 25, 2022," it said.
The Commission said that the 86 RUPPs that have been delisted were found to be "non-existent either after a physical verification carried out by the respective Chief Electoral Officers (CEOs) of concerned states/UTs or based on report of undelivered letters/notices from postal authority sent to the registered address of concerned RUPP." The Election Commission had similarly delisted 87 and 111 RUPPs on May 25 and June 20 respectively.
The decision against 253 non-compliant RUPPs was taken based on reports received from CEOs of Bihar, Delhi, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu, Telangana and Uttar Pradesh, it said, adding that they were categorised as inactive, as they have "not responded to the letter/notice delivered to them and have not contested a single election either to the general assembly of a state or the Parliament election 2014 and 2019."
These RUPPs have failed to comply with statutory requirements for more than 16 compliance steps since 2015 and are continuing to default, the EC said. The Income-tax department had last week conducted raids against certain RUPPs in some states as part of a tax evasion probe against them. The department is understood to have taken a decision on the basis of the EC action undertaken against the RUPPs in May-June following which it wrote to the Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) to take "requisite action under extant legal framework." The CBDT is the administrative authority for the tax department.
Some of the parties that have delisted include Bhartiya Deshbakht Party, Shiromani Akali Dal (Republic), Ambedkar Samaj Party, Voters Party.