New Delhi: Union minister of rural development Jairam Ramesh has made a strong pitch for a “serious expenditure audit” on the amount of money spent by political parties in the recently concluded Lok Sabha polls.
“There must be realistic expenditure norms and there must also be a genuine expenditure audit, because with this level of funding that we are seeing, this is another threat to Indian democracy,” he said.
Claiming that the BJP’s prime ministerial nominee Narendra Modi’s campaign spending had reached astronomical levels Mr Ramesh maintained that the Congress had spent “peanuts” in comparison to the poll expense of the Gujarat strongman.
“The amount of money the BJP’s PM nominee has spent is astronomical. Taking a front page advertisements in newspapers will tell you the story on the amount of money that has been spent. The Congress didn’t take out even one full page front page ad ,” he said while terming the spending as “obscene.”
“This high spending means that only contractors and real estate developers can fight polls. An honest person can’t fight,” Mr Ramesh added.
