The Supreme Court has rejected a petition filed by Congress leader Meenakshi Natarajan, challenging the decision which rejected her nomination for the Rajya Sabha seat in Madhya Pradesh. The Article 329 of the Constitution prohibits the court from interfering with the electoral processes that are ongoing, and that the appropriate remedy in action is an election petition pertaining thereto, ruled the court.
A bench of Chief Justice PK Mishra and Justice AS Chandurkar, however, refused to wade in, reiterating that in general, courts do not step in once the elections have started. “But the bench has said that if Meenakshi Natarajan raises such petition ahead of the appropriate forum then it will not bar him from pleading all such arguments,” the bench said.
Senior advocate Abhishek Manu Singhvi, appearing on behalf of Natarajan, argued that it was because of failure to disclose a summons issued by a Hyderabad court. He urged the court that the case was, as yet, not mature enough to frame charges or take cognisance and therefore Gambier’s rejection amounted to a question. He asserted that the removal amounted to a question because it is an area where charges have not been framed and cognisance taken of the case. The returning officer’s decision, Singhvi pointed out, had taken an arbitrary decision and disrupted the “level playing field” in the poll.
In reaching this determination, however, the Court was guided by prior decisions and restated that election-related disputes were to be resolved via election petitions, not via writ proceedings. The bench observed that exceptions would result in uncertainties in elections and weaken the Constitutionality of the electoral system.
Chief Justice Mehmood Ibrahim had earlier asked for the EC not to take action owing to the ongoing process and the Election Commission went ahead with the procedure, leading to BJP’s Mahesh Kewat being declared unopposed. Natarajan’s nomination had been questioned after a complaint was made concerning her lack of the information on her nomination papers.
The decision represents a major step in the decades-long conflict, but also opens the path for more elections-related litigation to follow.