Five years after Congress candidate Jai Tirath Dahiya won polls for Rai Assembly seat victorious with a margin of just three votes from Haryana’s Rai Assembly constituency, the Punjab and Haryana High Court has declared his election void.
According to Justice Harinder Singh Sidhu it has been proved in the present case that nine void votes were cast in favour of the returned candidate and two void votes were cast in favour of the petitioner, Inderjit.
“It is clear that the result of the election in so far as it concerns the returned candidate has been materially affected by the improper reception of void votes in his favour,” Justice Sidhu said.
Following the deduction of the void votes, valid votes polled by the returned candidate were 36,694 and the votes polled by the petitioner were 36,698. In conclusion, petitioner Inderjit polled 4 votes more than respondent Dahiya.
Further, the Bench added that Tirath Dahiya’s counsel on August 19 had told the court that he had resigned from his seat in the Haryana Legislative Assembly on August 1. The resignation was accepted by the Speaker of the Haryana Vidhan Sabha.
Justice Sidhu asserted no person would vote in the same constituency more than once. If such person voted twice in that constituency, all his votes in that constituency would be void.
These void votes were required to be deducted from total votes polled by the candidate in whose favour they have been cast.
Petitioner Inderjit Singh had contested the 2014 Assembly polls in from Rai on INLD ticket.
