Chandigarh raises objections to plea challenging mayoral poll

Chandigarh, January 20

The Punjab and Haryana High Court today fixed February 4 for hearing a petition by Anju Katyal of the Aam Aadmi Party and two other councillors. They had moved the Court for declaring the election results for the Chandigarh Mayor’s post illegal. Directions were also sought to hold fresh elections to the Mayor’s post.

As the case came up for preliminary hearing before the Bench of Justice Ritu Bahri and Justice Ashok Kumar Verma, UT senior standing counsel Anil Mehta took technical objections and requested for the dismissal of the petition.

Mehta submitted that the petitioners had not challenged the declaration of the results. They had, rather, placed on record a newspaper cutting and challenged the same. Mehta added that the petitioners had also challenged the appointment of the Senior Deputy Mayor and the Deputy Mayor, but had not made them a party to the litigation.

Mehta also told the Bench that the petitioners had raised certain objections on January 8. The next day, an order was passed dismissing their objections. But the same was not challenged by the petitioners. After hearing the objections and rival submissions, the Bench adjourned the hearing to February 4, when the petition with amendments may be placed before the Bench.

Katyal, Prem Lata and Ram Chander Yadav had submitted that their petition pointed out “various political atrocities openly carried out at the behest of ruling political party bigwigs in Chandigarh”. The petitioners submitted that AAP secured 14 seats and became the largest party in the elections. But the results did not go well with the BJP, in “power in the Municipal Corporation for the last elections”.

Upon counting of all 28 polled votes, eight votes were kept out for ‘defects’. “AAP clearly won with a margin of two votes, 11 votes falling into the kitty of petitioner – Katyal of the AAP and nine to the BJP candidate,” the petitioners added.

But the presiding officer and the prescribed authority-cum-Divisional Commissioner arbitrarily started to reconsider the eight ballot votes from the cancelled/rejected lot and proceeded to declare a torn/mutilated voter slip cast to a BJP candidate as good for counting.

The petitioners added the final tally headed for a tie with 14 votes each, even after counting the defective/torn voter slip cast. The presiding officer, himself an elected BJP councillor, started playing otherwise by picking one ballot slip/vote cast in the petitioner’s favour to cite a mark on its backside without showing it. The respondents immediately declared the vote/ballot slip in the petitioner’s favour as ‘cancelled’. The BJP candidate was suddenly declared elected with 14-13 margin to utmost shock and surprise of the petitioner, other members of the House and the public at large, it was added.