As many as 256 Zilla Parishad members have declared having an educational qualification of graduation and above. This was revealed in a report by the Odisha Election Watch and Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR).

The ADR has analyzed the self-sworn affidavits of 726 out of 851 Zilla Parishad members in the Odisha Panchayat Elections 2022. The rest of the affidavits were not analyzed as they were not available or uploaded on the website at the time of making this report.

The report said that as many as 451 (62%) Zilla Parishad members have declared their educational qualification to be between Class V and XII pass, while there are 6 Zilla Parishad members who are diploma holders. Similarly, seven Zilla Parishad members have declared themselves to be just literate and six Zilla Parishad members have not given their educational qualification data.

Besides, out of the 726 Zilla Parishad members analyzed, 95 are crorepatis. This includes 90 from BJD, three from BJP and two from Congress.

“The average of assets per Zilla Parishad member in the Odisha Zilla Parishad Elections 2022 is Rs 56.60 lakh.  The average assets per Zilla Parishad member for 661 BJD ZP members is Rs 58 lakh, 37 BJP ZP member is Rs 48.61 lakh, 22 INC ZP member is Rs 37.35 lakh, 3 JMM ZP members is Rs 16.08 lakh,” said the report.