Madhya Pradesh High Court
Democratic Lawyers Forum (Group Of ... vs Union Of India on 14 August, 2015
WP-13224-2015 (DEMOCRATIC LAWYERS FORUM (GROUP OF ADVOCATES ) Vs UNION OF INDIA) 14-08-2015 Shri Ravindra Kumar Gupta for the petitioner. Shri J.K. Jain, Assistant Solicitor General, for Union of India/respondent No.1.
Shri Ravish Agrawal, Advocate General, with Shri P.K. Kaurav and Shri K.S. Wadhwa, Additional Advocate Generals, for respondent No.10.
Shri Vinay Tiwari on behalf of Shri Sidharth Seth for respondent Nos. 5 and 6.
Yesterday, when the matter was taken up for hearing and we were considering the question of admission, Shri K.S. Wadhwa â learned Additional Advocate General, present invited out attention to certain paper publications filed vide Annexure P/1 and posed a question as to whether based on the paper report, this Court proposes to take action in this Public Interest Litigation.
Being conscious of the aforesaid objection, we indicated in open Court that we are only concerned about implementation of the statutory rule and for considering the question of laying down policies and directions, if any, in the matter or to call for from the competent authority as to what policies and directions are available in the matter of conducting fair elections, in the back drop of the statutory rules framed under Article 309 of the Constitution i.e⦠Central Civil Services (Conduct) Rules, 1964; and, limited to that purpose only we intended to issue notice.
However, inadvertently, all these facts were not specifically mentioned in the order as was passed by us, while issuing notice to the respondents. Immediately thereafter, Shri K.S. Wadhwa, in the second part of the day, informed us that the notice issued by this Court is being construed in a manner as was not intended by the Court at the time of hearing. As such, we directed for listing of the matter today and after hearing all concerned, we clarify that when we directed issuance of notice, our intention was for issuing notice limited to the purpose of examining as to whether the Union of India; the State Government; the Election Commission of India; and, the State Election Commission have laid down policies, guidelines and instructions in the matter of ensuring that the Conduct Rules of Government Servants are followed and implemented during the course of election, so that a fair election is held. To that limited extent only, we propose to issue notice.
Accordingly, we direct issuance of notice only to respondent Nos. 1, 5, 6 and respondent No.10, who is the Returning Officer for the Election. We may clarify that the incident indicated in this petition pertaining to election of Mayor for the City of Jabalpur is not being looked into in this writ petition, as the allegations made with regard to conduct of the said election, can be agitated in an election petition, and is, therefore, beyond the jurisdiction of this Court and, accordingly, we are not inclined to take cognizance of these allegations made with regard to conduct of the election or any other matter connected or related to the election of Mayor. Limited to the extent of laying down policies and guidelines, the notice has been issued. As far as the remaining respondents are concerned, no notice to them is required. They have been impleaded as parties with regard to the incident narrated in the writ petition and as we are not taking cognizance of the said incident, we see no reason to notice all these respondents.
We may clarify at the cost of repetition that the incident narrated in the writ petition, if established, would amount to misconduct in the conduct of an election, which is beyond the purview of this Court, this is an issue to be considered in an Election Petition; and we do not propose to go into that question at all, in this writ petiton.
During the course of hearing â Shri Ravish Agrawal, learned Advocate General, objected to the locus of the petitioner in filing this writ petition and wanted to point out certain vested and malafide interest of the petition in filing this writ petition.
Learned Advocate General is granted liberty to point out all these facts by way of an affidavit and after considering the same and giving an opportunity to the petitioner to respond to them, we will consider the question of locus standi of the petitioner, to file this writ petition.
Accordingly, except the respondents to whom notices have been issued, all other respondents be deleted from the array of the respondents. Their names be deleted and necessary corrections be made in the cause title within seven days.
The order passed by us yesterday stands accordingly modified.
List the matter after four weeks.
(RAJENDRA MENON) (SUSHIL KUMAR GUPTA)
JUDGE JUDGE