Engineer Rashid gets Election Commission notice for discrepancy in poll expenditure

Rashid has been given a two-day time to file his response. The Commission has asked Rashid or his representative to appear before the Commission within two days to clarify his position and address the issue of discrepancy in the election expenditure.

The notice has warned that if Rashid failed to comply and address the discrepancy in poll expenditure, the Election Commission may act against him under the Representation of People’s Act and it could lead to his disqualification for a period of three years.

While Rashid’s son Abrar, who campaigned in absence of his father, and other leaders have been publically maintaining that they have spent only a little less than 30000 rupees for the election campaign, the notice says that they have submitted a poll expenditure of Rs 2.10 lakhs. RasRas’s party leaders have been maintaining that people have voluntarily come with their own vehicles and other poll material in their election rallies.

Rashid won the Lok Sabha polls from the Baramulla parliamentary seat defeating Omar Abdullah and Sajad Gani Lone. The jailed leader, who is lodged in Tihar after he was arrested in an alleged money laundering case related to terror funding by the National Investigation Agency (NIA) in 2019, is yet to take oath. The court has allowed him on a two-hour parole to take oath on July 5 in the speaker’s room.

The Election Commission allows a candidate to spend Rs 95 lakhs for his poll related activities during the Lok Sabha elections. The limit for the assembly election for a candidate, however, is Rs 40 lakhs only. However in some smaller states and union territories, the spending limit for a Lok Sabha candidate is Rs 75 lakhs and Rs 28 lakhs for the assembly seat candidate. There is, however, no expenditure limit for the political parties.

While the candidates are required to file the expenditure statement before the Election Commission, the Commission’s observers regular monitor the expenditure of the candidates on their own as well.