AAP Councillor Moves Supreme Court Against HC's Refusal To Stay Chandigarh Mayor Election

An Aam Aaadmi Party(AAP) councillor has approached the Supreme Court challenging the refusal of the Punjab and Haryana High Court to stay the Chandigarh Mayor polls.

AAP councillor Kuldeep Kumar has filed the Special Leave Petition aggrieved by the decision of the High Court to list his petition after three weeks without granting an immediate stay of the results.

He moved the High Court alleging vote tampering in the Chandigarh Mayor Elections, where Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) candidate Manoj Sonkar emerged victorious on Tuesday. The BJP candidate secured 16 votes against the 12 votes received by Kuldeep Kumar, the candidate backed by Congress and AAP. The Presiding Officer rejected 8 votes as invalid.  

He sought setting aside of the impugned election result "as the same is a result of complete fraud and forgery laid upon the democratic process" and prayed for holding of fresh elections in a free and fair manner under the supervision of a retired High Court Judge.

Yesterday, the High Court denied his prayer to dissolve the functioning of the office until further orders. "Whether counting was proper, whether procedure was followed or not…These are all questions of facts," it reasoned.