The Diplomat Desk
Jammu:T,DD Justice Rajneesh Oswal today directed issuance of notices to Election Commission of India, Chief Electoral officer J&K, UT of J&K, Home Department, Returning Officer Chenani Assembly constituency, besides several others including the Returned candidate from the said constituency in an Election Petition filed by the JKNPP India candidate Harsh Dev Singh who challenged the said election and sought declaration of the said election as null and void and setting aside the same. The notices were issued by Justice Rajneesh Oswal after being declared as Election Tribunal under section 80 of the RP Act by the Hon’ble Chief Justice of J&K High Court.
Arguing in the case, A battery of lawyers including Aseem Sawhney, Tehsina Bukhari, Raj Pratap Singh, Mohd Kashiv, Mohit Mankotia, Yasin Tak and Pallav Sharma appeared for the petitioner, stated that the Chenani assembly election had been vitiated due to large scale corrupt practices, bribery, undue influence, use of religion for votes, promoting hatred amongst classes on ground of religion, false and mischievous publications, dis-information, use of govt servants and govt machinery in elections, bias and prejudice of tainted officers in the conduct of elections, concealment of material facts in the Affidavit beside improper acceptance of the Affidavit of Returned Candidate by the RO alleged to have given overt and covert support to the Returned Candidate.
Pointing towards the faulty Affidavit submitted by the Returned Candidate, the petitioner said that despite defects of “substantial nature” as enumerated by ECI and concealment of material facts therein including non-disclosure of complete details of Assets and Liabilities, suppression of information regarding dues to govt, the nomination form of the Returned candidate was liable to be rejected. Quoting section 100(1)(d)(1) of RP Act, Harsh Dev maintained that the improper acceptance of the nomination form of the Returned candidate which had substantial defects as stated “ECI in guidelines and Apex Court rulings” making it a faulty, defective and incomplete affidavit and hence the election was liable to be set aside.
The lawyers for petitioner further argued that the bribery of voters in Chenani Election was unprecedented in the history of Indian elections wherein returned candidate and his supporters distributed sarees, Suits, Umbrellas, T-shirts, under garments, bags besides cash and liquor to the voters on a massive scale. Several complaints in this regard fell flat with the concerned authorities maintaining a cold silence and directly and indirectly supporting the official BJP candidate i.e. the returned candidate. The respondent no.5 to 9 i.e. police officers and RO openly assisted the returned candidate and facilitated free movement of cash, liquor, sarees suits T-shirts and bags by them while intimidating, threatening, persecuting and arresting JKNPP India workers/ supporters. That the workers of JKNPP India were threatened of physical elimination by the BJP candidate of the Chenani assembly constituency who further assured his workers that nothing would happen to them if they chopped the heads of Panthers workers. Repeated complaints of bribery, corrupt practices and threats made to respondents ECI/CEO J&K in this regard were downplayed with no action whatsoever taken by the concerned authorities, asserted the petitioner.
The Petitioner, Harsh Dev Singh had taken the plea that the Returned candidate resorted to ‘Undue influence’ as defined in Section 123 RP Act by issuing threats of injury, by using religion and promoting hatred amongst classes on grounds of religion. The petitioner while referring to some video interviews of returned candidate and his social media posts claimed that a malicious, highly malevolent and pernicious vilification campaign was launched against him by the returned candidate and his personal character and conduct was called in question to prejudicially affect his electoral prospects thereby attracting the provisions of Section 123(4) of RP Act.
The petitioner said that he was not only dubbed as anti-national, pro- Pakistani, member of Gupkar gang, Pakistan sponsored candidate, supporter of Hijbul Mujahiddin and Palestnian Mujahiddin, ‘terrorist gang’ but his (petitioner’s) blood and DNA was also questioned and challenged. Such false malicious propaganda and character assassination of the petitioner unleashed on a massive scale completed altered the political narrative in the constituency thereby most prejudicially affecting the Election results against the petitioner and in favour of the returned candidate. The returned candidate all along gave the impression through his social media posts and interviews that he(returned candidate) was a nationalist and petitioner as anti-national and supporter of terrorists.
Further, the petitioner claimed that threats of sexual assault and molestation of mothers and sisters of opposition workers and voters were given by the agents/workers of BJP which had been duly recorded and submitted in the Court in the form of a pen drive.
It was further argued that several govt. employees and officers were deployed to openly campaign for the BJP candidate whose campaign photographs and social media posts were also openly circulated but no cognizance taken by a biased administration. The petitioner stated that the hired media, local media supported the vilification campaign of the BJP candidate directly describing the petitioner as ‘terror supporter’, ‘anti-national’ besides giving their judgements even prior to the conduct of Elections in favour of the BJP candidate.
Justice Rajneesh Oswal after hearing the counsel for petitioner observed that a prima facie case had been made out against the Respondents and directed issuance of notices to 19 respondents,TDD
