5 thousand troublemakers under lens ahead of Punjab polls

CHANDIGARH: With Punjab's crime rate and shootouts between gangs becoming a sensitive political issue, the Election Commission has mapped more than 5,000 potential troublemakers across the state who could hamper polls in early 2017.
A report jointly prepared by the commission, Punjab Police and state's chief electoral officer has identified as many as 5,369 troublemakers. The commission has not mentioned the political allegiance or affiliation of these troublemakers at present.
In a first, the report also says that it is going to monitor social media campaigns of political parties as they mobilise public opinions.“We are happy with the social media outreach but we are worried of its use to incite people on issues of religion which can go unnoticed at times due to lack of cyber laws,“ said a senior commission official.“There are chances of personalised high-pitched campaigns and also clashes. We are going to follow Twitter and Facebook accounts of political parties, their key candidates, and campaigners.“
These revelations come barely a day after Chief Election Commissioner Nasim Zaidi expressed concern over police-politician nexus over appointments in Punjab during his visit to Chandigarh. Interestingly, the commission's documents show Patiala, Captain Amarinder Singh's home constituency as having the maximum troublemakers 455 of them.
The state's most cosmopolitan district, Ludhiana, comes second with 359.Union food processing minister Harsimrat Kaur Badal's home district Bathinda isn't far behind, occupying the third spot with 307 troublemakers.
The report, accessed by TOI, also discloses a concern on 20,968 proclaimed offenders and absconders.
Many of them have been booked for heinous crimes and are yet to be arrested or have jumped bail.
Yet again, the city of business czars, Ludhiana tops the list with 3,072 such criminals who are at large.Jalandhar city, with 3,026 criminals, comes second and Jalandhar rural's 1,555 criminals come third. Amritsar city , which will witness high-pitched poll battles, have 1,563 and 563 such criminals.