The Supreme Court on Friday dismissed a petition filed by Congress leader Meenakshi Nataranjan challenging the rejection of her nomination for the Rajya Sabha elections from Madhya Pradesh, dealing a setback to the party.
A Bench of Justices PK Mishra and AS Chandurkar said that disputes related to the rejection of nomination papers should be addressed through the remedies available under election laws and before Election Commission, rather than through Court intervention at the pre-election stage.
According to the report, the bench questioned whether the apex court had ever intervened in a similar matter at the stage of nomination scrutiny.
The top court also said that once a nomination is rejected, the only remedy is to approach the poll panel. “However erroneous the decision may be, once a nomination is rejected, the remedy ordinarily lies elsewhere. Is there any judgment of this Court where we have interfered at that stage?,” the court was quoted as saying by news agency PTI.
Nataranjan had approached the Supreme Court after her nomination papers were rejected by the Returning Officer over allegations that she failed to disclose details of a pending criminal matter in her election affidavit.
“It is submitted that any non-disclosure would entail rejection of nomination and the Returning Officer has not committed any error,” the court said according to Live Law.
The Congress argued that no criminal case was pending against Nataranjan and maintained that only a legal notice had been issued, which did not require disclosure under the relevant provisions of Form 26. The party had also urged the Election Commission to overturn the Returning Officer’s decision.
"No criminal case comes into existence...There's a notice to her by a court based on a private complaint, well before the court has taken cognizance. The issue of cognizance is yet to be decided after hearing her," senior Congress leader Abhishek Manu Singhvi had said.
The ruling comes amid a heated political contest over the Rajya Sabha elections in Madhya Pradesh, where the rejection of Nataranjan’s nomination significantly affected the Congress’s prospects.
