'No writs after polls begin': Supreme Court rejects Meenakshi Natarajan's plea

NEW DELHI: Supreme Court Friday dismissed Congress campaigner Meenakshi Natarajan’s petition challenging rejection of her information for Rajya Sabha elections from Madhya Pradesh, refusing to carve retired an objection from the judicially well-settled rule that bars courts from entertaining predetermination disputes aft commencement of the canvass process.“The remedy is filing of an predetermination petition” to situation the predetermination of the returned candidate, said a partial moving time seat of Justices Prashant Kumar Mishra and A S Chandurkar, which delivered the verdict aft elder advocator A M Singhvi, for Natarajan, made a strong, though unsuccessful, bid to transportation the tribunal to carve retired an objection to the wide regularisation and trial the validity of the returning officer’s decision.After an hour-long proceeding, during which elder advocator Mukul Rohatgi for the BJP campaigner whose predetermination was facilitated by Natarajan’s disqualification and solicitor wide Tushar Mehta for MP govt cited a judgement wherever SC had refused to entertain a akin plea against rejection of information papers, the seat said the SC oregon HC cannot entertain writ petitions successful workout of their jurisdictions nether Articles 32 oregon 226 of the Constitution.

Once the predetermination process commences with the notification of polls.Natarajan’s information papers were rejected arsenic she failed to disclose a pending transgression lawsuit based connected a backstage ailment successful her predetermination affidavit. Singhvi said connected the backstage complaint, the proceedings tribunal has lone issued summonses to her and that nary cognisance has been taken. The ailment was primitively not against Natarajan and claimed her sanction was added 3 years aboriginal aft she was made AICC in-charge for Telangana.Singhvi said the RP Act requires a campaigner to disclose successful his canvass affidavit lone specified cases wherever a chargesheet has been filed and charges person been framed. This was contested successful unison by Rohatgi, Mehta and advocator Kanu Agrawal, who said since 2018, it has been mandatory to disclose each pending transgression cases, including those wherever chargesheets person not been filed oregon charges person not been framed.The seat refused to participate the governmental thicket and brushed speech Singhvi’s complaint of sedate mala fide against EC and said, “The instrumentality is well-settled successful a catena of judgments starting from SC’s six-judge seat judgement successful N P Ponnuswami lawsuit successful 1952 and has been consistently followed without immoderate dilution that the jurisdiction of SC and HCs are barred from entertaining petitions relating to canvass disputes erstwhile the predetermination process commences.

”