New Delhi: India's recent national election delivered a historic victory to Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Hindu nationalist party, but also exposed the influence of money, power and questionable morality on the world's largest democracy.

Nearly 43 per cent of the new members of the lower house of Parliament that convenes Monday for the first time since the election won despite facing criminal charges. More than a quarter of those relate to rape, murder or attempted murder, according to a report by the civic group Association of Democratic Reforms.

Elected lawmaker Pragya Singh Thakur, in orange dress, who is awaiting trial in connection with a 2008 explosion in Malegaon in western India that killed seven people, greets other lawmakers at an alliance meeting to elect Narendra Modi as their leader in New Delhi, India. Credit:AP

The loophole that allows them to take office is that they have not been convicted - in part because the Indian legal system has a huge backlog of an estimated 30 million cases and trials often last decades. When asked about the charges against them, they invariably accuse a political rival of framing them.

Since such rivalries often lead to false accusations, the main political parties say it would be unfair to bar people from contesting elections unless they have been convicted by court.