Odisha’s New Assembly Will Have 107 Crorepati MLAs

Bhubaneswar: The new Assembly in Odisha will have more than 100 crorepati MLAs, according to a report of the Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR) and the Odisha Election Watch.

The analysis of the self-sworn affidavits of all 147 winning candidates in the Assembly Elections 2024 in the state, conducted by ADR and the Odisha Election Watch, mentioned that 107 (73%) newly elected candidates have declared assets worth more than Rs 1 crore.

This supercedes 95 (65%) crorepati MLAs out of 146 MLAs analysed during Assembly elections 2019; 76 (52%) out of 147 MLAs in 2014 and 33 (22%) in 2009 elections.

The analysis of party-wise crorepati candidates revealed that the BJP has highest 52 (67%) out of its total 78 candidates. The BJD has come second with 43 (84%) out of 51 candidates, followed by the Congress with 9 (64%) of 14, 1 (100%) by CPI(M) and 2 (67%) out of 3 Independent candidates with over Rs 1 crore declared properties.

The report further mentioned that 17 (12%) candidates have properties worth more than Rs 10 crore; 17 (12%) have Rs 5 crore to Rs 10 crore; 73 (49%) with Rs 1 crore to Rs 5 crore and 35 (24%) candidates have properties worth Rs 20 lakh to Rs 1 crore.

The average assets per winning candidates in 2024 elections is Rs 7.37 crore against Rs 4.41 crore in 2019 elections, Rs 3.22 crore in 2014 and Rs 1.71 crore in 2009 elections.

The average assets of BJP’s 78 winning candidate is Rs 3.92 crore, that of BJD’s 51 candidates Rs 14.36 crore, Congress’ 14 candidates Rs 1.82 crore, CPI(M)’s one candidate Rs 1.11 crore and 3 Independents’ Rs 6.22 crore, the report stated.