The Supreme Court overturned the Presiding Officer’s (RO) decision to name a BJP candidate as Chandigarh’s mayor on January 30 and named Kuldeep Kumar, a candidate for the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), the victor of the mayoral election. The ruling was issued by a panel consisting of Chief Justice of India (CJI) DY Chandrachud, Justices JB Pardiwala, and Manoj Misra. The court dismissed RO Masih’s argument for declaring the eight votes cast for the AAP candidate to be null. “Counting the eight votes for the petitioner (AAP candidate Kumar), he will receive 20 votes. The eight votes that were deemed illegitimate by putting those markings. We order the presiding officer to void the election’s outcome. The Chandigarh mayoral election is declared to have been won by the AAP candidate,” the court ruled. Additionally, the Court expressed significant disapproval of returning officer Anil Masih’s actions.
Masih was found to have “unlawfully altered the course of the mayoral election” and to have made a “patently false” declaration in front of the court. As a result, Masih received a show cause notice from the court. ” Masih could not have been unaware that the statement he made was untrue. Section 340, CrPC, which relates to Section 195, which deals with “prosecution for contempt of lawful authority of public servants,” requires the Registrar Judicial to provide Anil Masih with a justification for why action should not be taken against him. The Court ruled that Anil Masih will be given the chance to respond to the show cause notice.
The AAP Councillor Kuldeep Kumar filed a suit with the court on January 30, alleging fraud in RO Masih’s declaration of Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Manoj Sonkar (who has since resigned) as Chandigarh’s mayor. On January 30, Manoj Sonkar of the BJP was proclaimed the winner of the mayor’s race, receiving 16 votes as opposed to Kuldeep Kumar of the Congress-AAP’s 12 votes. This was in spite of the AAP-Congress alliance’s 20 members holding a majority in the chamber. Eight of the 36 votes that were cast were disqualified as invalid during the counting process.
Kuldeep Kumar, an AAP councillor, first contested the results of the mayor poll before the Punjab and Haryana High Court. He filed a plea with the Supreme Court after the High Court rejected its request to suspend the election results. Notably, three AAP council members joined the BJP, and BJP candidate Sonkar resigned as mayor on Monday while the case was still before the highest court. The Supreme Court noted this development on Monday and expressed its “distress” over such “horse-trading.”
During the Monday session, Masih stated that he had just annotated (marked with ticks and “x”) the eight ballot papers that the AAP-Congress coalition had provided to identify them as having been “defaced.” Subsequently, the Court directed that the voting documents and the video recording of the ballot counting procedure be presented to it.
The ballot papers were given to the court when the case was brought up for hearing today. Upon scrutinising the ballots, the bench observed that the votes cast in support of the AAP candidate were evidently marked as illegitimate by Masih. “Look at Manoj Kumar and Kuldeep Kumar. Eight votes were declared illegitimate, and each of those eight has been stamped with Kuldeep Kumar’s name. The RO signs at the bottom and places a single line there. He does this everywhere. Mr. Masih, I have a question for you. You mentioned that you put the line there because it was vandalised. Where has the vandalism occurred? requested CJI Chandrachud.
“Masih stated that in court as well! Senior Advocate AM Singhvi, who was representing Kuldeep Kumar (the petitioner before the court), continued, “Anil Masih made the felony worse by repeating that before this court.”
Senior Attorney Mukul Rohatgi provided the following defence of Masih’s actions: If one looks closely, one can notice a tiny dot. What he has done is show that there is a tiny dot in one of them. Certain ballot papers have their edges curled inward. He deemed the same to be dismissed based on a single-line tick. Masih was only observed glancing up at the CCTV cameras in the counting area, according to Rohatgi, because there was a “commotion outside.” ” With cameras around, this is something no one can do. Rohatgi stated, “There isn’t a guilty individual staring at the camera. Rohatgi further said that, following the courtroom’s playback of the video showing the vote count on January 30,
“It is evident that the AAP members stole the votes. A portion of the dots are folded. You can say anything you want, but never refer to someone as a thief. His looking at the camera, etc., was completely inappropriate.” However, the Court retorted that before any disturbances or efforts to steal the voting papers, Masih could be seen making these marks first and announcing the outcome. Gurminder Singh, the Advocate General (AG) of Punjab, countered that Masih’s version of events was false.
“They request that voters fold the ballots laterally. The RO gave his own explanation of the process. You may watch it on video. Masih is deceiving his senior counsel, and he knows full well why Dot is there. The AG informed the Court that he requested that it be folded.
Following hearings from both sides, the court found that Masih had tampered with the election procedure. As a result, it rejected Masih’s election results and proclaimed the AAP candidate the victor.
