Contractors, builders, education and mining mafias and owners of chit fund companies will be seen in the fray in the coming assembly elections of Uttar Pradesh. The numbers of trained professionals such as doctors, lawyers and teachers will come down as far as the list of probable contestants in concerned.

These facts were revealed on Tuesday in a study conducted by the Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR) and National Election Watch (NEW) on the prospective candidates in the coming UP assembly elections. Giving details of this study report, the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of ADR Election Watch, Maj. Gen. (retd.) Anil Verma said that in the UP assembly soon after independence the maximum number of legislators were lawyers, teachers and other trained professional but their number is coming down now.

He said that study finds a maximum number of candidates who have sought tickets from various parties or are interested in contesting elections are either contractors, builders, education mafias or in the mining business. Besides a good number of those running chit fund companies are willing to contest elections.

Convener of UP Election Watch Sanjay Singh said that during study a survey was conducted in 60 assembly segments of different areas of UP. He said that survey finds that among such candidates, 21% are contractors while 18% are builders. Also a good number of 17% are running private educational institutes while 15% owned chit fund companies and 13% are in the business of mining.

Singh informed that ADR UP Election Watch has been running campaign against use of money and muscle power in the elections. He said that programmes are being run in various assembly segments to promote ethical voting. The ADR UP has constituted monitoring committees in 60 districts of state.