Supreme Court Issues Notice On Maneka Gandhi's Plea Challenging Election Of Samajwadi Party's Ram Bhuwal Nishad In 2024 Lok Sabha Polls

The Supreme Court today issued notice on senior BJP leader Maneka Gandhi's plea challenging the election of Samajwadi Party MP Ram Bhuwal Nishad from the Sultanpur Lok Sabha constituency. At the same time, it refused to entertain a writ petition filed by Gandhi challenging Section 81 of the Representation of People Act, 1951, which was ultimately dismissed as withdrawn with liberty to press two prayers sought therein in the first petition (a civil appeal).

A bench of Justices Surya Kant and N Kotiswar Singh passed the order, stating, "after arguing for some time, learned senior counsel for the petitioner, on instructions, seeks to withdraw the writ petition with liberty to raise prayer Nos. 2 and 3 in Civil Appeal no. 10644/2024 which is filed against judgment dated 14 August 2024 of the Allahabad High Court. Ordered accordingly".

Issuing notice on the appeal, arising out of an Allahabad High Court judgment which dismissed Gandhi's election petition as barred by limitation, the Court gave 4 week's time to respondent-Ram Bhuwal Nishad to file counter-affidavit.

During the hearing, Senior Advocate Siddharth Luthra (for Gandhi) argued that the judicial determination in Hukumdev Narayan Yadav v. Lalit Narain Misra (where the Supreme Court held that Sections 4 to 24 of the Limitation Act will not apply to proceedings under the Representation of People Act, 1951) requires re-examination. Alleging that respondent-Nishad suppressed material facts regarding 4 criminal cases, he also urged that an elector's right to know true facts about political candidates has acquired the status of a constitutional right.

Insofar as the issue in the writ petition centered on limitation period of 45 days for presentation of an election petition (under Section 81 of the RP Act), Justice Kant remarked that Gandhi was essentially praying that the court legislate and put in place an alternate limitation period. Luthra objected saying that it was not the case, however, the bench was not convinced.

"If we start interfering in this kind of...look at the serious consequences...nobody will file an election petition, then directly...entire purpose of the legislation will be defeated", observed Justice Kant. In reply, Luthra urged that the purpose of the RP Act is to be seen from the focus of the nature of 'corrupt practices' and the right of the electorate to know about candidates.

As the senior counsel spoke of the purpose of the legislation, Justice Kant voiced an opinion that laws should periodically be reviewed by the legislature. "[For] every law, there should be a kind of a legislative review also...[they should] not be confined only to judicial review...there should also be legislative review of the laws from time to time...you can have maybe after 20, 25 or 50 years...and then one should have an expert body to find out whether this law has worked well, what was the object for which it was enacted, has it really succeeded in achieving that object...if not, what are the deficiencies, what are the bottlenecks or gray areas that need to be taken care of...we really wish that we can work that kind of an institution", said the judge.

Insofar as Luthra asserted that the Supreme Court "legislated" in Hukumdev case, Justice Kant expressed that this argument could be available in the civil appeal filed by Gandhi, but not in the writ petition (as the appeal is against the judgment which dismissed Gandhi's election petition relying on Hukumdev). "Therefore you can say it's not a good law and requires consideration by the larger bench. But here, as prayer No.2, you can't ask for this prayer", the judge said.

As such, the writ petition was dismissed as withdrawn, with liberty to press two prayers made in the writ petition during the hearing of the civil appeal.

Background

Nishad defeated Gandhi (then sitting MP, Sultanpur) by 43,000+ votes in the Lok Sabha Elections 2024. While Nishad got 4,44,330 votes, Gandhi managed to get 4,01,156 votes, leading to her defeat.

Challenging Nishad's election, Gandhi filed an election petition before the Allahabad High Court, with a seven-day delay. She accused Nishad of not accurately disclosing in his nomination form the criminal cases pending against him. It was claimed that while filing Form-26 during the election process, Nishad disclosed only 8 criminal cases, whereas there were actually 12 cases pending against him.

On August 14, the Lucknow bench of the Allahabad High Court dismissed Gandhi's petition, holding that it was filed in contravention of Section 81 read with Section 86 of the RP Act, as well as barred by limitation.

For context, Section 81 of the RP Act provides a 45-day period from the date of election of the returned candidate, and if the dates for elections are different, then the later date for filing the election petition. Section 86 requires the High Courts to dismiss election petitions that do not comply with Sections 81, 82, and 117.

Gandhi beseeched the High Court to condone the delay as she was hospitalized and delay was only of 1 week. However, her petition was dismissed. Challenging Section 81 of the RP Act, as well as the decision of the High Court, she approached the Supreme Court.

Case Title:

(1) MANEKA SANJAY GANDHI v. RAMBHUAL NISHAD, C.A. No. 10644/ 2024

(2) MANEKA SANJAY GANDHI v. UNION OF INDIA, WP(C) No. 588/2024

Click Here To Read/Download Order