GoM on State funding of elections set up

By Our Special Correspondent

NEW DELHI, AUG. 17. The Government today announced setting up of a Group of Ministers (GoM), headed by the Union Home Minister, Mr. L.K. Advani, to consider recommendations of the Indrajit Gupta Committee on State funding of elections.

The decision to constitute the GoM was taken at a meeting of the Union Cabinet, presided over by the Prime Minister, Mr. Atal Behari Vajpayee, last night, an official spokesperson said today.

Other Ministers in the GoM will be the Finance Minister, Mr. Yashwant Sinha, the Law Minister, Mr. Arun Jaitley, the Parliamentary Affairs Minister, Mr. Pramod Mahajan and the Administrative Reforms Minister, Mr. Arun Shourie.

The Committee on State Funding of Election, headed by the former Union Home Minister and veteran CPI leader, Mr. Indrajit Gupta, had submitted its report to the Government on January 14, 1999.

The Indrajit Gupta panel had called for overhauling of the electoral process so that elections were free from vitiating factors like money and muscle power and criminalisation of politics.

It had favoured State funding of elections, saying it was justified constitutionally and legally, but expressed the view that such funding should be confined only to the parties recognised as national or State parties by the Election Commission.

Any State funding should be in kind and not in cash, the panel had recommended.

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Section  : National
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