New Delhi: Around 35% chief ministers in India have criminal cases against them and 81% of them are crorepatis, found an Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR) report released on Monday.

The ADR and National Election Watch have analysed the self-sworn affidavits of current chief ministers in state assemblies and Union territories across the nation. These were the latest affidavits filed by them prior to contesting the elections.

As many as 25 chief ministers are crorepatis, and two of them have assets to the tune of over Rs 100 crore. The average assets of chief ministers are worth Rs 16.18 crore.

Andhra Pradesh’s Chandrababu Naidu emerged the wealthiest chief minister with declared assets worth over Rs 177 crore, followed by Arunanchal Pradesh’s Pema Khandu (over Rs 129 crore) and Amarinder Singh of Punjab (over Rs 48 crore). The chief minister with the lowest declared assets is Tripura’s Manik Sarkar with assets worth Rs 27 lakh, followed by West Bengal’s Mamata Banerjee (over Rs 30 lakh) and then Jammu and Kashmir’s Mehbooba Mufti (Rs 56 lakh)

Criminal cases

The report analysed 31 chief ministers of states and Union territories, and found 11, or 35%, of them to have declared the criminal cases registered against them.

Further, 26% chief ministers have serious criminal cases against their names, including murder, attempt to murder, cheating and dishonestly property dealings and criminal intimidation.

Maharashtra’s Devendra Fadnavis tops this list with 22 criminal cases, followed by Kerala’s Pinarayi Vijayan with 11 cases. Delhi’s Arvind Kejriwal is a close third with ten cases against him, most of which are for unlawful assembly, obstructing a public servant from discharge of their duty and defamation, reported News18.

Uttar Pradesh’s Adityanath has only four criminal cases against him but the charges include injuring or defiling a place of worship with intent to insult, rioting and trespassing burial grounds. Jammu and Kashmir’s Mehbooba Mufti has one case against her, as does Bihar’s Nitish Kumar, however the case against him is under section 302 of the IPC, which relates to murder.

The report also analysed the educational qualifications of chief ministers and found 10% of 31 chief ministers are 12th pass, 39% graduates, 32% graduate professional, 16% postgraduate and 3% doctorate.

(With PTI inputs)