Guwahati, April 9: The Gauhati High Court has dismissed a petition challenging the election of BJP candidate Kripanath Mallah, who had won from Karimganj constituency in the Lok Sabha elections held last year.
The High Court dismissed the petition of Congress candidate Hafiz Rashid Ahmed Choudhury on the ground of lack of proper attestation of the petition.
In the order passed recently, Justice Sanjay Kumar Medhi observed that from pages 1 to 84 of the copy served, the election petitioner had put his signature under a rubber stamp “attested to be true copy of the petition,” whereas from pages 85 to 185, the election petitioner has put his signature under a rubber stamp “certified to be true copy”.
The Court noticed that so far as attestation/certification was concerned, though it is the case of the election petitioner-opposite party that there is no substantial difference in the two terms, the requirement under Section 81(3) is that attestation has to be made to be a true copy of the petition.
“This Court has verified from the documents annexed to the IA and found that while the pages from 1 to 84 of the Election Petition which was served, the endorsement is “attested to be true copy of the petition”, in the rest of the pages, the endorsement is “certified to be true copy”,” the Court stated in its order.
“Thus, even if the argument made on behalf of the opposite party that there is no substantial difference between the aforesaid terms is considered, it is seen that so far as the endorsement “certified to be true copy” is concerned, it has not been stated that such certification is pertaining to true copy of the petition which is the requirement of Section 81(3),” it stated.
“…While this Court is not inclined to accept the contention made on behalf of the applicant regarding the missing four pages in the copy served, the other ground on which the IA has been presented under Section 86(1), namely, lack of attestation/proper attestation has substance. This Court is not able to accept the submission made on behalf of the opposite party regarding substantial compliance and suffering of prejudice inasmuch as, such requirement under the statute is mandatory in nature which is fortified by laying down a consequence of any violation thereof,” it said.
The court also allowed an application moved by Mallah seeking dismissal of Choudhury’s election petition on the ground that its presentation was not in accordance with law and that the election petition was filed in violation of the procedure laid down in Sections 81 and 83 of the Representation of The People Act.