Gujarat assembly elections: In a decade, 250% hike in candidates’ expenditure

Over the past decade, the Election Commission of India (ECI) has hiked permissible spending by candidates for an assembly election by 250%.
In the 2012 assembly election, candidates could spend up to Rs 16 lakh during campaigning. For the 2022 election, each candidate can spend a whopping Rs 40 lakh.
There will, however, be no cap on spending by political parties. The permissible election expenditure by candidates for the general election (Lok Sabha) was Rs 70 lakh for the 2014 and 2019 elections. In case a byelection is held in 2022, the permissible expenditure will be Rs 95 lakh.
A key political leader managing the legalities of the candidates’ expenditure said, “We organize special training for first-time candidates about how to keep accounts in order to avoid intervention from the ECI. Those who have already been MLAs have a fair idea of how expenses are managed.
In most cases, the expenses of candidates exceed the permissible limit, and we absorb the additional cost by showing it as party expenses.” The ECI, meanwhile, has issued instructions for effective monitoring of the election expenditure of candidates.
It has formed flying squads, static surveillance teams, and video surveillance teams. The ECI will also involve the state police, the investigation directorate of the Income Tax Department, the Central Board of Excise and Customs, the Enforcement Directorate, the Financial Intelligence Unit, the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence, the Reserve Police Force, the Central Industrial Security Force, the Border Security Force, the Indo-Tibetan Border Police, the Indian Coast Guard, the Commercial Tax Department, the Narcotics Control Bureau and the Department of Post.
The state excise department has been asked to monitor the production, distribution, sale and storage of liquor and inducements in the form of free goods during the election process.
The functioning and operations of the flying squads/mobile teams shall be closely monitored using GPS tracking/and the use of the c-VIGIL App. For greater transparency and ease of monitoring of election expenses, candidates would be required to open a separate bank account and incur their election expenses from only that account.