Orissa High Court dismisses plea against minimum deposit money

CUTTACK: The Orissa High Court on Tuesday dismissed a petition that challenged the validity of Section 34 of the Representation of the People Act, 1951 under which minimum deposit money for contesting election for MLA and MP was increased from Rs 5,000 and Rs 10,000 to Rs  10,000 and Rs 25,000 respectively.

President of Odisha Durniti Sangharsa Mancha, Uma Charan Mishra had filed a petition in 2018. The division bench of Chief Justice S Muralidhar and Justice RK Pattanaik said, “The legislative scheme appears to be that even if a person of modest means who has to borrow to make a deposit of the minimum amount for elections to the Parliament or the Legislative Assembly, as the case may be, is unable to win the election, he can still hope to get the amount refunded provided of course he is able to secure a minimum number of votes.” 

“This way the elections are open to serious candidates and not to non-serious ones, who are not in a position to even muster the minimum range of support. The court is unable to find the scheme itself to be arbitrary and irrational. It appears to be logical,” the bench observed. 

The bench said it gives sufficient room for serious candidates to contest the election and requirement of deposit of money does not act as deterrent, particularly since it is an amount that is refundable in terms of Section 158 of the RP Act. “Even otherwise, empirically the petitioner has not been able to demonstrate any negative impact that the increase in the deposit amount has had on the right to contest an election,” the bench further observed.