The Madras High Court on Wednesday rejected an election petition filed by All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) candidate A. Munusamy who was defeated by Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam’s R.T. Arasu at the Cheyyur Assembly constituency, reserved for Scheduled Castes, last year by a margin of 304 votes.
Justice P.N. Prakash first struck down a substantial portion of the pleadings made by the election petitioner on the ground that they were vague and bereft of specific details regarding allegations of improper counting of postal votes as well the votes polled using EVMs in 19th round of counting. He consequently dismissed the election petition itself.
“This court cannot start off with the presumption that the Returning Officer had not properly counted the postal ballots and the votes in the EVMs in the 19th round,” the judge said and pointed out that a burden was heavily cast on the election petitioner to make sufficient averments and place material facts to prove a prima facie case of alleged misdeeds.
He agreed with Senior Counsel P. Wilson, representing the returned candidate, that the court need not conduct a full-fledged trial in an election petition if the petitioner had not produced even bare minimum material facts to prove his allegation of the Returning Officer having acted in favour of the candidate who was declared successful in the election.
“From a reading of the entire averments in the election petition, it is seen that the petitioner has not even stated the number of postal votes that were secured by him and the returned candidate,” the judge said and culled out the details from a chart issued by the Returning Officer who had stated that Mr. Arasu had secured 593 postal votes as against 223 secured by the petitioner.
Further, pointing out that Mr. Munusamy had secured totally 63,142 votes and lost the election to the DMK candidate who had got 63,446 votes, the judge said that the Returning Officer had rejected 84 postal votes for various reasons and did not take into account one more postal vote that had been cast for the None of the Above (NOTA) option.
He also cited the Supreme Court’s decision in Dhartipakar Madan Lal Agarwal versus Rajiv Gandhi (1987) wherein it was held that election tribunals could strike out pleadings if a petition does not make out any cause of action and consequently reject the petition itself if no triable issues remain to be considered in the petition.
“Unless prima facie materials are furnished, this Tribunal cannot allow a full trial for the purpose of letting in evidence and ordering recount and thereafter declare the results,” Mr. Justice Prakash concluded.