No Interference Allowed Once Elections Are Announced, Rejection Of Nomination Can Be Challenged Only Via Election Petition: SC Reiterates

The Supreme Court has directed the Deputy Commissioner of Jhajjar, Haryana, to immediately transfer the charge of Sarpanch of Asaudah (Siwan) village to the appellant, who was elected unopposed in the 2022 Panchayat elections.

The Bench of Justice Sudhanshu Dhulia and Justice Ahsanhuddin Amanullah passed the order while dealing with a legal dispute where the appellant's election was challenged by a competing candidate, Vinod, whose nomination was rejected due to questions over the validity of his matriculation certificate.

The appellant's election as Sarpanch had been held up by a Punjab & Haryana High Court order dated November 1, 2022, which allowed Vinod's nomination to be accepted provisionally, pending further verification of his educational qualifications. Despite being elected unopposed after Vinod's nomination was rejected, the appellant had not been given the charge of office due to the ongoing legal proceedings.

The Court, in its interim order, observed that the appellant, who was duly elected in a democratic process, should not be prevented from assuming office. "We are of the opinion that an interim order needs to be passed in this case as a candidate who has been duly elected in a democratic process cannot be stopped from assuming the elected office, particularly in the manner in which it has been done," the Court said.

The Court further noted that under the Haryana Panchayati Raj Election Rules, the proper recourse for Vinod would have been to file an election petition after the results were declared, rather than challenging the process through a writ petition.

"Under the law presently applicable as laid down by this Court, particularly in the case of “Mohinder Singh Gill & Anr. vs. The Chief Election Commissioner, New Delhi & Ors. reported in 1978 (1) SCC 405, once elections are announced, they should not be interfered with and after the election, the only remedy is to file an election petition and the rejection of a nomination paper is definitely one of the grounds that can be raised in an election petition. The respondent no.1 has not availed this remedy. More so, he has not even made appellant as a party in the writ petition," the Court observed in its September 10 order.

Further, the Court noted, "The consequence of all this has been that the appellant who is an elected candidate is being denied the office to which he has been elected. Mr. Siddharth Mittal, learned counsel for respondent no.4 - State Election Commissioner accepts this position as to the facts but would also contend that a petition has also been filed by the Election Commissioner (Respondent no.4) challenging the same order of the High Court, which is pending as SLP(C)No.21612/2022 titled as State Election Commissioner Haryana & Ors. vs. Vinod & Anr."

Accordingly, the Court tagged the case with a separate petition filed by the State Election Commissioner of Haryana, which is also pending before the Apex Court. The Court clarified that its observations would not affect the rights of the parties to file an election petition challenging the appellant's election. "..this appeal be tagged with the aforesaid SLP(C)No.21612/2022, so that suitable orders be passed in both the matters. We also make it very clear that any of our observations here will not prejudice the rights of any of the parties in case they choose to file an election petition challenging the election of the appellant to the office of Sarpanch," the Court said.

Cause Title: Sandeep Kumar v. Vinod & Ors.

Appearance:-

Petitioner: Senior Advocate Rameshwar Singh Malik, Advocates Jitesh Malik, Jatin Hooda, Abhaya Nath Das, Sunil Kumar Das, Monica Goel, Satish Kumar (AOR)

Respondent: Advocates Siddharth Mittal (AOR) Darshan Sejwal, Sumit Kumar Sharma, Abhijeet Varshney

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