Explainer: What do we know about the 'Pecuniary interests' of our MPs?
Sai Krishna Muthyanolla
September 25, 2019
Pecuniary & other business interests of lawmakers can have a significant bearing in the discharge of their duties. These interests also highlight the conflict of interest of our MPs. But what do we know about the pecuniary interest of our MPs? Here is an explainer.
The pecuniaryinterests of lawmakers can often result in conflict of interest and have abearing on the discharge of their duties. Maintaining a record of theseinterests would help democratic institutions to have an understanding on thepossible self-interest of the members and the possible conflict in the variouslaws being made. It would also help understand the impact of the presence ofcertain members in different legislative and policy making committees.
The law surrounding the disclosure & maintenance of such ‘pecuniary interests’ data varies from country to country, with many of the democracies across the world working towards bringing in greater transparency and accountability in this area. India also has a provision in place for maintaining a register of pecuniary interests of its Members of Parliament (MPs), but only for the MPs of the Rajya Sabha.
Register for
Members’ Interest is maintained only by the Rajya Sabha
Rajya Sabha hasan explicit provision for
maintenance of ‘Register of Members’ Interest’. The register is maintained underthe authority of the Rajya Sabha’s committee on ethics. As per theseprovisions, MPs of Rajya Sabha have to declare their
interest in the following five categories.
On the other hand, the Lok Sabha does not have any such provision for declaration of ‘pecuniary interests’ with members being required to declare only their assets and liabilities. They are not obliged to declare any other pecuniary interests that might have with a direct or indirect bearing on discharge of their roles.
Though theRajya Sabha maintains the ‘Register of Members’ Interest’, it is neither availablein the public domain nor on the Rajya Sabha website. The Register can only beaccessed by filing a RTI application.
ADR(Association for Democratic Reforms) and NEW (National Election Watch) havefiled a RTI application for Register of Members Interest and have procured the same with thedetails of Rajya Sabha MPs as on 04 January 2019.
Note on the Data: Since the data is as on 04 January 2019, some of the MPs may have retired and others may have switched parties. The party affiliation mentioned in this story is as on 04 January 2019.
Only 41.8% of
the MPs have declared pecuniary interests
ADR’s analysis of the Register of Members’ Interest of Rajya Sabha MPs, notes that the pecuniary interest details have been submitted by 213 sitting members of Rajya Sabha. As on 04 January 2019, the details are not available for 17 members as they have not submitted their declaration of pecuniary interests.
Of the MPswho have provided their declarations, 89 (41.8%) have stated that they havepecuniary interests which fall under the defined five heads. On the other hand,majority of the MPs i.e. 124 MPs (58.2%) have declared that they do not haveany financial interests which fall under any of the five heads.
What is the most common form of ‘Pecuniary Interest’?
It hasto be noted that, the pecuniary interest of an individual MP can be under morethan one category. ‘Shareholding of controlling nature’ is the most common formof pecuniary interest with 44 MPs declaring their interest under this head. Another40 MPs have declared financial interest under ‘Professional engagement’ withonly 2 MPs declaring under the head ‘Paid Consultancy’.
A totalof 24 and 30 Members of Rajya Sabha have declared their pecuniary interests ofthe nature ‘Remunerative directorship’ and ‘Regular remunerated activity’respectively.
Pecuniary interest of the highest value isunder the head ‘Shareholding of controlling nature’ with BJP MP from Bihar, RavindraKishore Sinha having individual shares worth Rs. 525 crores and overall shares(including self, spouse and dependent) to the tune of Rs. 747 crores.
Congress MP Abhishek Manu Singhvi, memberfrom West Bengal has declared shares worth Rs. 386 crores of which Rs. 382crores worth of shares are on his name. Further, Abhishek Manu Singhvi has alsodeclared Rs. 177 crores as the amount received under ‘Professionalengagements’. Under the same category, Congress’s P. Chidambaram has declaredamount earned as Rs. 33 crores, followed by nominated member of Rajya Sabha,KTS Tulsi with Rs. 27 crores. KTS Tulsi is one of the two MPs who have declaredpecuniary interest under ‘Paid Consultancy’ with amount of Rs. 27.5 lakhs. Dr. VikasHaribhau Mahatme, is another MP under this category with pecuniary interest tothe tune of Rs. 5.6 lakhs.
D. Kupendra Reddy, JD(S) MP from Karnatakadeclared an amount of Rs. 40 crores as received from ‘Remunerative directorship’, followed by RajeevChandrasekhar, BJP MP from Karnataka who declared Rs.7 Crores under this head.
124 of the 213 MPs who have made declarations, state that they do not have pecuniary interest under any of the 5 heads. Of these MPs, Subbirami Reddy of the Congress from Andhra Pradesh has the highest assets, worth Rs. 422 crores. C.M. Ramesh of TDP, now in BJP, has declared his assets to the tune of Rs. 258 crores with no pecuniary interest.
What about such disclosures in other countries?
Many of the major democracies lay emphasis onhaving such provisions for its law makers. The provisions in various countries differfrom one another.
United Kingdom (UK)
United Kingdom’s Parliament requires all itsmembers to register all their current financial interest in the Register of Members’ Financial
Interests. Allthe new MPs are required to provide the details within a month of theirelection and the existing MPs need to furnish the changes if any within 28days. They are required to register details like Salaries, fees or payments ofany kind, gifts for services performed, allowances , ex-gratia payments,payments for opinion surveys, donations received for support as MP etc. These detailshave to be furnished along  details ofthe company or the payer. Pension payments, dividends, earnings received asmember of parliament or a minster of cabinet, earnings of member’s spouse,partner or family members are exempted from declaration. Unlike in India, theregistration of Interests is applicable for both the houses i.e.  House of Commons and House of Lords.
Australia
Australia also has a provision for registration of interest for its members of Parliament, applicable for both Senators and Members of House of Representatives.  The registrable interests fall under 14 categories like Shareholdings, directorships, real estate, partnerships, bonds, debentures, gifts over certain value etc.
New Zealand
Since 2005, the Members of Parliament in New Zealand are also required to furnish the details of their pecuniary interests. The Register of Pecuniary and Other Specified Interests of Members of Parliament contains the details like – Company directorships, Shares and Bonds, Employment, Interest in Trusts, Real property, Investment Schemes etc. New Zealand also has a provision for external audit where ‘The Office of Auditor General (OAG)’ reviews and if needed conducts an enquiry into the returns filed by the Member of Parliament.
Canada
In Canada, the Conflict of Interest Code specifies 12 heads under which thefinancial interests of the Members of Parliament fall under. These include – Governmentcontracts, Shares in Private Companies , Trusts, Sources of Income etc.
United States
In UnitedStates, under the ‘Ethics in
Government Act’, the public representatives have to file their
pecuniary Interests under-  Financial Disclosure,Gift/Travel, Lobby Disclosure and Post Employment. An online process using ‘Financial Disclosure
Online Reporting Application’ is in place tofacilitate online filing of the financial disclosure.
Current
provisions are limited, Reforms needed for better reporting
Theprovision for declaration of pecuniary interests for MPs of Rajya Sabha is an initialstep towards resolving the conflict of interest issues pertaining to publicrepresentatives. While such a provision has to be made for MPs of the LokSabha, the provision in place for Rajya Sabha and its enforcement has left alot to be desired.
In thereport by ADR, 58.2% of the MPs who made declarations specify that theirpecuniary interests do not fall under any of the 5 categories. However, areview of their assets makes one wonder if the provisions for these  declarations are enough. There are MPs withassets running into hundreds of crores, but still have not declared anypecuniary interest in these 5 categories.
In manyof the countries as noted above, the pecuniary interest declarations includecategories like real estate, savings/investment accounts etc. which  if included in India, will see more MPs fromthe Rajya Sabha declaring interests under those categories.
Timelyand prompt disclosure is another important aspect of these disclosures. Asalready stated earlier, 17 members have still not declared their pecuniaryinterests by the time ADR filed the RTI. Further, like in other countries, allsuch declarations made by MPs should be placed in the public domain, throughthe website of the Rajya Sabha. It should not require individuals to file RTIsto get this information.
A revised law  that covers a wide range of areas in terms of pecuniary interests is the need of the hour to bring in transparency in the affairs of public representatives.
Featured Image:Pecuniary interests of our MPs