Election Commission to come down heavily on use of black money in polls

Chief Election Commissioner SY Quraishi Monday said the Commission will come down heavily on use of black money during the forthcoming polls in five states and asked political parties to adhere strictly to its guidelines framed in this regard.

Accompanied by two other Election Commissioners VS Sampath and HS Brahma, Quraishi was speaking after inaugurating a one-day workshop for political parties on election expenditure monitoring here.

A total of 58 representatives of both national and state-level political parties from Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Uttarakhand, Goa and Manipur participated in the workshop.

"The EC will come down heavily in cases of black money during the forthcoming polls," Quraishi said.

Quraishi said the Election Commission (EC) has put stronger measures to monitor illegal cash movement and funds during polls, after learning from the experiences of last year Assembly polls in Bihar and few other states like Tamil Nadu and West Bengal recently.

Quraishi said the political parties should exercise self restraint on election expenditure and strictly adhere to the new set of instructions issued by the EC in this regard recently.