The Calcutta High Court has reserved its verdict on a petition challenging the nomination of Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) candidate Hasirani Rath from Nandigram, following allegations of discrepancies in her election affidavit concerning her age and educational qualifications.
The hearing before Justice Krishna Rao concluded after arguments from the Congress, the Election Commission and Rath’s legal representatives. The court is yet to pronounce its decision on the petition, which seeks cancellation of her candidature over what the Congress has described as apparently contradictory information in documents submitted to the poll panel.
The controversy centres on an elementary question: how could a candidate have passed the Madhyamik examination in 1965 if her stated age places her birth around 1966?
According to reports, the Congress has challenged the affidavit submitted by Rath, the mother of Chandranath Rath, the slain aide of West Bengal Chief Minister Suvendu Adhikari.
The Congress alleges that Rath’s affidavit contains a mismatch between her age and the year of passing the secondary examination.
In her nomination papers, Rath reportedly declared her age as “60+ years”. The educational qualification section, meanwhile, refers to her passing the Madhyamik examination in 1965 from Chowkhali Ganga Padma Milan Kanya Vidyapith.
The Congress argues that the two entries cannot be reconciled without further verification. If Rath was around 60 years old in 2026, her birth would fall around 1965-66, making the stated examination year particularly difficult to explain.
The petition also questions whether the school had the necessary recognition to conduct Class X education at the time mentioned in the affidavit.
Congress leader and advocate Riju Ghosal, who raised the matter before the court, argued that the discrepancy warranted an inquiry into the candidate’s educational records and the scrutiny conducted by the Election Commission.
The party has sought cancellation of Rath’s nomination if the allegations are established.
BJP cites typographical error
The BJP has rejected the allegations, maintaining that there is no substantive discrepancy in Rath’s age or educational background.
According to The New Indian Express and The Times of India, the party has claimed that Rath studied in Class X in 1980 and that the reference to 1965 in the affidavit was a typographical mistake. The BJP has also produced a school-issued certificate indicating her date of birth as June 8, 1965.
That explanation, however, leaves the question of how the conflicting entries came to appear in the election affidavit and whether the supporting documents were adequately checked before the nomination was accepted.
Rath has expressed faith in the judicial process. “I have full faith in the law. Whatever decision the court will take, that will be taken,” she told the media.
The Election Commission’s position, as reported during the proceedings, is that objections to nomination papers must ordinarily be raised before the returning officer during the prescribed scrutiny process. The poll panel has argued that once scrutiny is completed without an objection, the scope for challenging the nomination through the present proceedings is limited.
Rath’s counsel has also argued that the discrepancy was not deliberate and that the candidate should be given an opportunity to address any error.
The legal question before the High Court is therefore not merely whether the entries appear inconsistent, but whether the court can intervene at this stage and whether the alleged error provides sufficient grounds to cancel the candidature.
Nandigram bypoll amid political uncertainty
The dispute comes as Nandigram prepares for a by-election on October 6, with counting scheduled for October 9.
The seat fell vacant after Adhikari, who won both Nandigram and Bhabanipur in the 2026 Assembly elections, retained Bhabanipur and relinquished Nandigram.
The BJP subsequently nominated Rath, whose son Chandranath was shot dead in May, two days after the Assembly election results were announced. The BJP has presented her candidature against the backdrop of her son’s killing.
