Thirty-seven per cent of the

sitting MLAs in West Bengal - 104 out of the 282 - have

criminal cases against them, according to a study jointly

conducted by the West Bengal Election Watch and the

Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR).

In a report released on Wednesday, the civil society

organisations said that 90 (32 per cent) of the sitting

legislators in the state assembly have declared having serious

criminal cases against them.

"Serious criminal cases" are non-bailable offences

that entail punishment for more than five years, a

spokesperson of the West Bengal Election Watch (WBEW) said.

The WBEW along with the ADR has analysed the criminal

background, financial, education, gender and other details of

sitting MLAs based on their self-sworn affidavits and found

that 61 of the 205 Trinamool Congress MLAs and 15 of the 39

legislators of the Congress have serious criminal cases

against them.

Ten of the 24 CPI(M) MLAs, three of the BJP''s six

legislators and one Independent MLA also have serious criminal

cases against them.

Seven MLAs have cases related to murder against them,

24 have been booked in attempt to murder cases while cases

related to crime against women have been lodged against 10

MLAs, according to the "Analysis of criminal background,

financial, education, gender and other details of 282 MLAs out

of the 294 sitting MLAs".

Ten seats are vacant in the current assembly, while

analysis of the affidavits of two MLAs could not be done as

they were "unclear", the report said.

There are 97 ''crorepati'' MLAs. Of them, 78 belong to

the ruling TMC and 13 are from the Congress, it said.

The CPI(M) and the BJP have two crorepati MLAs each

and of the two other such legislators, one belongs to the

Revolutionary Socialist Party and one is Independent.

The survey also found that 92 MLAs have educational

qualification between 8th standard pass and 12th standard pass

while 187 are graduates and above.

While two MLAs are diploma holders, one is just

literate, it stated.

There are 41 women MLAs (15 per cent of the total

strength) in the assembly, while 185 (66 per cent) are aged

between 51 and 80 years.

The analysis has been done on the basis of the

affidavits submitted by candidates prior to the 2016 assembly

elections and by-elections conducted after that.

The next assembly election will be held in eight

phases between March 27 and April 29.