It is not every day that the home minister of a state is arrested in what appears to be a case of plain violation of the law. Five days before Assembly elections in Nagaland, home minister Imkong L. Imchen has been taken into custody. The minister, who is a candidate of the Nagaland People’s Front for the state legislature, is alleged to have been carrying cash to the extent of more than a crore of rupees, besides a large stock of arms and ammunition. A couple of days earlier, another NPF candidate was caught ferrying a crore of rupees in a helicopter. If nothing, these arrests suggest that the Election Commission takes its job seriously, and that its mission to clean up poll-related corruption in the country is not to be doubted.
The corollary of this is that national and state-level lawmakers must do what they can to strengthen the EC’s hands. The very least legislators can do is to find practical ways to adopt the EC’s stringent suggestion to bar criminals from becoming candidates. The law in this regard is flaccid at present. The EC can advance its own cause — which is co-terminous with that of the nation — by making a compendium of arrests made and successful prosecutions in cases involving transporting of cash to influence polling in the past few years, and release this to the media. Public awareness of such matters will also play a part in stopping parties from nominating crooks.