In Punjab, chances are that the next MLA people will chose  will be a CC (read: crorepati criminal). While chances are quite slim that the elected candidate will be a women.

A report released by NGO Association for Democratic Reforms and Punjab Election Watch says 65 percent candidates contesting in the upcoming the assembly elections are crorepatis and 15 percent of them have declared criminal cases pending against them. Only seven percent women candidates have been fielded by political parties in the assembly elections.

The report reveals that a total of 266 candidates out of 408 have assets, movable or immovable, of value more than Rs 1 cr. In fact 42 of them have assets worth more than Rs 10 cr.

The same report says that 61 out of the 408 candidates contesting the Punjab elections have declared criminal cases against them. Out of these 61 candidates, 22 candidates have declared serious pending criminal cases such as murder, attempt to murder, kidnapping, robbery etc against them. All major parties stand united in this category. While INC has 23 out of 116 (20%) candidates who have pending criminal cases against them, SAD has 18 out of 93 (19%), BSP has 9 out of 61 (15%) and PPP has 7 out of 89 (8%) candidates analyzed with pending criminal cases.

Only 29 candidates (7%) running for the seats are women.The number of women candidates for INC is 10 out of 116 (9%), for SAD it is 10 out of 83 (12%),for PPP it is 4 out of 89 (4%), for BSP it is 2 out of 61(3%) and for BJP it is 2 out of 21 (10%).

The report presents a rather disturbing trend ongoing in politial parties where money power reigns over ability and honesty.

While women are still not given a chance to prove their mettle, criminals are considered good by the parties to gain votes by intimidating voters.