How much do Election candidates earn?

Politicians are among the richest people in a country. They have multiple sources of income apart from their salaries as public servants. These sources are multi layered and quite complex. Politicians earn a lot of money even if they aren't qualified enough. Read to find out about the earnings of a general politician.

BY HARDIK GOEL | 7 min Read

A student with a Bachelor degree in information Technology or software engineering from a reasonably good university is predicted to land a salary package of around Rs 10 lakh every year. whereas someone who is beginning out as a selling manager, consultant, editor, PR specialist would possibly get close to Rs 6 lakh as their annual package.

Many  Indians gain expertise and then go onto pursue their Masters for a good CV and a better pay combined with huge job opportunities. However, MLAs or even election candidates in India with a max qualification of a secondary school are earning close to Rs 25 lakhs annually.

Nearly 1/2 the MLAs have declared their profession as business or agriculture. twenty five per cent have declared business as their profession, and twenty four per cent MLAs as an agriculturist/farmer. 711 MLAs within the Southern region having the highest average annual income of Rs 51.99 lakh. a great deal of MLAs who have declared themselves as illiterate earn an average annual income of Rs 9.31 lakh.

You might be wondering that the amount seems a bit too high for a government servant. However, this amount varies in different states with the highest salary of Rs. 2.5 lacs per month given to MLAs of Telangana while the lowest salary Rs.34000 given to the MLAs of Tripura.

Now for this article, let’s breakdown the sources of this salary of a Delhi MLA :

Salary	Rs 12000/- per month
Constituency Allowance	Rs 18000/- per month
Secretarial Allowance	Rs. 10,000/- per month
Conveyance Allowance	Rs. 6,000/- per month
Telephone Facilities	Rs. 8,000/- per month to meet the cost of telephone call charges
Daily Allowance	Rs. 1,000/- per day (subject to a maximum up to 40 days per year) for attending Assembly session/committee meetings etc.
Conveyance Advance	Upto Rs.4,00,000/- (repayable within his office term)

In addition to these expenses a MLA or election candidate receives free fooding and lodging facilities in the  guest houses owned by the government and separate expenses for traveling to his/her constituency. After adding all the expenses MLA receives a sum of around Rs.1.87 lacs per month.

The MLA also has the power to allocate 250 hand pumps to provide safe water in his constituency in five years. Apart from this; a person can travel free with MLA in the train.

What benefits does an MLA get after retirement?

After the expiration of five year term; the MLA gets Rs.30000/month in the form of pension, also as Rs. 8000 as diesel expenditure, beside the benefits of free railway pass and medical facility throughout the life.

It is worth to say that in the last seven years; the typical remuneration of MLAs has been enhanced near about 125th.The remuneration of MLAs of Delhi assembly has been enhanced by 450% and the remuneration of MLAs of Telangana enhanced by 170th.