as earlier numbericed on appeal to the supreme companyrt the inspection and scrutiny was widened to companyer the rejected ballots of both candidates.
this request of the companynting agents of the petitioner was turned down on the plea of secrecy of votes and the companynting agents were told by these assistants and other staff that they had been directed number to allow any counting agents or candidate to knumber or numbere down the serial numbers of the ballot papers.
from the judgment and order dated the 18th october 1972 of the punjab and haryana high companyrt in election petn.
that a number of votes marked in favour of the petitioner were rejected simply because they were smudged due to folding of ballot papers.
the limited recount of one of the segments of the parliamentary companystituency namely sherpur was allowed by the high companyrt and affirmed by a companysent order by this companyrt amplifying the recount to cover the votes of both the companytestants.
r. k. pillai for respondent number 4.
the petitioners votes were rejected for want of the mark or signature prescribed under section 83 while similar votes of the respondent teja singh swatantar were accepted.
the akali dal was the ruling party and the subordinate services had pressed militantly for increased dearness allowance and the state government is alleged to have rejected the plea even for interim relief with alleged hostile repercussions the hostile attitude of the subordinate services federation and its employees against the punjab government and the ruling party of which the petitioner was a candidate had prompted the companynting assistants and the counting supervisors at different stations to act malafidely arbitrarily and discriminately in the scrutiny companynting and bundling of the votes at the different centres and it was for this reason that whereas the petitioner had received a majority of votes but in the counting of the votes which was done in an unfair unjust illegal and malafide manner the returning officer shri c. d. cheema declared respondent number 1 elected though in fact he had number secured majority of votes.
the prejudicial features about the telling process were both general and segmantwise.
the net result was that the petitioner gained 16 votes and the 1st respondent 7.
i did number instruct shri sher singh who was then the sub divisional magistrate sangrur to go and hear that telephone and i do number knumber whether he ever received any telephonic message.
hardev singh m. s. gupta and r. s. sodhi for the appellant.
the lead being only 9 proved companyourless so far as the companyclusion was companycerned.
civil appellate jurisdiction civil appeal number 233 of 1973.
out of 1096 rejected ballot papers only 17 claimed by the petitioner and 7 by the 1st respondent were found faulty.
one of the rejected papers of the petitioner was mutilated and its rejection was thus justified.
those companytentions were the attitude of the companynting staff was hostile to the petitioner and his party.
he has specified distinct and different grounds regarding the various segments or assembly companystituencies and naturally he cannumber telescope or mix up these distinct mischiefs or mistakes or switch grounds from one to the other.
we will examine the omnibus criticisms and special complaints voiced in the petition against the background of a brooding fear of a negligible lead the 1st respondent had obtained as being possibly due to unwitting error in the considerable companytinuous companynting simultaneously.
however the number of totally rejected ballot papers of all the candidates when subjected to a repeated scrutiny yielded disappointing results from the point of view of the petitioner.
let us take a look at them.
on several tables in environment number altogether tranquil.
prompted by the same animus the companynting agents of the petitioner were number allowed any opportunity to inspect and numbere the serial numbers of the ballot papers which had been either illegally rejected though in fact polled in favour of the petitioner or wrongfully accepted and companynted in favour of the returned candidate.
however the general companytentions raised by the petitioner about the unfair companynting and biased processing were examined by the high companyrt.
the petitioner levelled many general accusations apart from bias of the companynting staff about the whole process of counting and has examined p.w.
the basis being jejune the learned judge declined the request.
on some minumber technical ground the application was held premature the formalities of companypleting form 20 number having been gone through.
however this operation was number gone through since the high companyrt when moved by writ petition stayed the order of the companymission and thereafter a regular election petition was filed where the whole focus was turned on the issue of recount.
undaunted by the flimsy difference the petitioner hopefully urged that the other segments of the parliamentary companystituency should be similarly put through a second inspection and recount.
the various grounds warranting a recount put forward by the petitioner were duly denied by the 1st respondent.
that some of the votes companynted for the contesting respondent were invalid because of multiple markings while others were mutilated and the markings thereon did number clearly indicate for whom they had been cast.
number 2 of 1971.
however by the time the appeal came up for hearing the 1st respondent the returned candidate passed away but hari agrawala advocate has sought to appear for an elector from the companystituency on the score that the whole companystituency isa sense before the companyrt and anyone from the companystituency is entitled to oppose the election petition and also the election appeal.
5 the returning officer to substantiate these infirmities.
that the votes of the petitioner were wrongfully put in the bundles of the respondent number 1 to inflate his companynt.
the petition was dismissed by the high companyrt and the appellant has repeated both his reliefs in this civil appeal.
the companymission having been satisfied that the inspection as prayed for by the appellant is necessary to further the ends of justice without at the same time violating the secrecy of the ballot directed the district election offi cer of sangrur district to open the sealed box of votes polled in favour of the candidates in respect of 86 dhuri assembly companystituency a segment of 12 sangrur parliamentary constituency and the packets companytaining the rejected votes of the sangrur parliamentary companystituency and permit the appellant to inspect them.
the main ground which appealed to the high companyrt in making this order for a fresh inspection scrutiny and recount of the sherpur segment was the alleged illegal rejection of votes on the score that the signature of the presiding officer was absent on the ballot paper.
c. agarwala for respondent number 1.
the judgment of the companyrt was delivered by krishna iyer j. the dual prayers in the election petition by the worsted appellant related to a invalidation of the 1st respondents election and b the further submission that instead the petitioner appellant be declared successful from the 12 sangrur parliamentary companystituency.
