Click to play videoHyderabad: Rs 45 lakh is the price of democracy in Andhra Pradesh. The amount, in cash, was seized by the Andhra Police in Adilabad in the last one week.
“It is sad that this kind of money is spent on buying votes instead of respecting the voters,” says a concerned voter in Hyderabad.
While another voter joins in adding, “Any person who spends money like this in politics considers it to be a business and nothing else.”
Across Andhra Pradesh, similar seizures are being made before polls. Rs 23 lakh in cash and over 300 liquor bottles were seized in Visakhapatnam, Rs 47 lakh in Warangal in just three days and Rs 12 lakh, in cash, near Chevella are a few examples of the money trail.
The state police have seized 14,000 beer bottles worth nearly Rs 10 lakh in Kurnool and hundreds of cricket kits, meant for young voters, in Adilabad.
In some constituencies in Hyderabad, parties are distributing mixer-grinders and pressure cookers to families. One candidate is even paying his voters’ utility bills.
Meanwhile, candidates in coastal Andhra are distributing silver coins while others in Telangana are paying Rs 500 each to their voters.
But candidates say no party is clean in this money fest.
Lok Satta’s Jayprakash Narayan says, “There are cases where the expenditure exceeds by Rs 5 crore and may be even Rs 10 crore in some cases. Most of all this expenditure is illegitimate and unaccountable.”
With an estimated Rs 2,000 crore likely to be spent, this will be Andhra's costliest election ever.
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