Our Achievements

  • ADR won the NASSCOM award for ICT led Innovation by Multi-stakeholder Partnerships. This award was for the Election Watch software of ADR and Webrosoft.
  • ADR won two milestone judgments on disclosure of candidate’s criminal and financial records from the Supreme Court in May 2002 and March 2003 respectively. Since then, 1200 NGOs from all over the country are supporting ADR and ADR in partnership with its partners has organized Citizen Election Watch for all major elections and disclosed candidate’s background information to the media and the public.
  • The Election Commission has completed a massive exercise based on the Gujarat Election Watch report to verify information filed by candidates in the nomination papers and affidavits, and has started proceedings against candidates with false declarations.
  • A Bill on Electoral Expenses was passed in September 2003. The EC has asked candidates to file a statement of expenses in every three days during the campaign. This information is made available to citizens on request to Returning Officers, District Election Officers and the CEOs.
  • Civil Society non‐partisan Election Watches are springing up in different states. In the Lok Sabha 2004 Elections, 19 States and 5 Union Territories carried out Election Watches. In the Lok Sabha 2009 elections, Election Watches were held in all states and union territories in the country.
  • Bihar Election Watch in October‐November 2005 resulted in intense pressure on the Chief Minister designate due to the extensive media coverage of candidate’s background. As a result, for the first time, Bihar has a Council of Ministers without any known criminal record.
  • The Election Commission inaugurated Civil Society led National Conferences on Electoral Reforms in Ahmedabad, Banglore, Patna, Lucknow, Mumbai, Bhopal and Chennai. These Conferences were action oriented and resulted in successful Election Watch campaigns.
  • The EC issued several very significant orders in the last two years relating to candidate disclosure, ensuring those affidavits are complete, taking action against false affidavits based on complaints, and disclosing electoral expenses.
  • In April 2008, ADR obtained a landmark ruling from the Central Information Commission (CIC) saying that Income Tax Returns of Political Parties would now be available in the public domain along with the assessment orders.
  • In the Karnataka Assembly Elections, 2008, there was a reduction in the number of candidates with serious offenses put up by parties. There were 93 such cases against candidates in the 2008 elections, down from 217 in the 2004 assembly elections.
  • Overall, the percentage of candidates with pending criminal cases came down from 20% to 14% in the assembly elections held in the country in 2008 for the states of Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, NCT of Delhi and Mizoram.
  • A large number of candidates with serious pending cases that contested Lok Sabha 2009 elections like Pappu Yadav, Atiq Ahmed, Mukhtar Ansari, Akhilesh Singh, etc. lost.
  • The number of total serious IPC sections against MPs decrease from 296 in Lok Sabha 2004 to 274 in Lok Sabha 2009.
  • On Jan 25, 2010 both the Congress Chief Ms Sonia Gandhi and leader of opposition in Lok Sabha Ms Sushma Swaraj of BJP made public statements calling for a consensus on barring candidates with criminal backgrounds from contesting elections.
  • On Feb 3, 2010 Prime Minister Manmohan Singh asked his Cabinet colleagues to disclose details of their assets and liabilities and refrain from dealing with the government on immovable property.
  • Because of an RTI application that ADR has been following up with the CIC for nearly the past 2 years, the contribution reports of major political parties have been made public.  Added to this is the fact that the Election Commission has taken proactive steps towards bringing in some level of accountability in the functioning of the political parties by getting the ICAI to develop reporting formats for political parties
  • In May, 2010, the Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh, Ms. Mayawati had announced the expulsion of about 500 party leaders with criminal past.
  • In January 2011, the Election Commission of India entrusted the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India (ICAI) with the task of developing accounting format for political parties.
  • Details of the movable and immovable assets of 30 Bihar ministers, including that of CM Nitish Kumar, were uploaded on the government website in January,2011. It is seen as a step aimed at ending corruption promised by the Chief Minister himself.
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