Poll inducement seizures cross Rs 400 crore in election-bound states, says EC

NEW DELHI: Cumulative seizures of poll inducements like illegal cash, liquor, drugs etc across the poll-going states/UTs have breached the Rs 400 crore mark, the Election Commission shared on Thursday.

"Since the activation of the electronic seizure management system (ESMS) on February 26, till March 25, 2026, nearly Rs 409 crore worth of illicit inducements including Rs 17.4 crore in cash, 16.3 lakh litres of liquor worth Rs. 37.7 crore, drugs worth Rs 167.4 crore, precious metals worth Rs 23 crore and other freebies worth over Rs 163.3 crore have been seized through

a coordinated approach involving multi-enforcement agencies across different states/UTs due for assembly polls and bypolls," according to an EC spokesperson.

Sources said Tamil Nadu accounts for the largest share of seizures; their total cumulative value was put by the state chief electoral officer at Rs 152 crore on March 24, of which Rs 31 crore was in cash, Rs 92 crore in precious metals, Rs 6.5 crore in drugs, Rs 72 lakh in liquor and Rs 22 crore in other goods and freebies.

EC had held a review meeting on March 24 with the chief secretaries, chief electoral officers (CEOs), director generals of police (DGPs) and senior officers from the 5 poll-going states/UTs and their 12 bordering states/UTs, besides the heads of enforcement agencies, to assess poll readiness and facilitate enhanced coordination for violence-free, intimidation-free and inducement-free elections.

To ensure this, over 5,173 flying squads have been deployed across the states/UT to ensure that the complaints are attended to within 100 minutes. Besides this, over 5,200 static surveillance teams (SSTs) have also been deployed for setting up nakas at different locations for surprise checks.

The Commission has asked the enforcement authorities to ensure that ordinary citizens are not inconvenienced or harassed during the checking and inspection for the enforcement of these directives. District grievance committees have also been set up to address any grievances in this regard.

C-vigil Module on ECINET.

Between March 15 and 25, 70,944 complaints were lodged using the C-Vigil app, of which 70,831 have been disposed of. Almost 96% or 67,899 complaints were resolved within 100 minutes.