Indian Kanoon - Search engine for Indian Law

ClVIL, APPELLATE JURISDICTION: Civil Appeal No. 936 of 1963, Appeal from the judgment and order dated May 31, 1963, of the Punjab High Court in First Appeal from Order No. 2/3 of 1963.

Purshotham Trikamdas, Rajinder Nath Mittal , R. B. Datar, V. Kumar. B. P. Singh and Naunit Lal, for the appellant. G.S. Pathak, Bawa Shiv Charan Singh, Hardev Singh, Rajendra Dhawan, Anand Prakash and Y. Kumar, for respondent No. 1.

February 12, 1964. The Judgment of the Court was, delivered by:-

SHAH, J.-At the general elections held in February 1962 five candidates contested the election to the House of the People from the Jhajjar parliamentary constituency. On February 27, 1962 the appellant Jagdev Singh Sidhanti was declared elected. Pratap Singh Daulta who was one of the candidates at the election then filed a petition with the Election Commission praying, inter alia, that the election of the appellant be declared void on the ground that the appellant-Sidhanti-his agents, and other persons with his consent,. had committed certain corrupt practices in connection with the election. Daulta stated that the appellant Sidhanti was set up as a candidate to contest the election by the Harding Lok Samiti, that the appellant and six other persons-Piare Lal Bhajnik, Ch. Badlu Ram, Pt. Budh Dev, Prof. Sher Singh, Mahashe Bharat Singh and Achilles Bhagwan Dev who were leaders and active workers of the Gurukul Section of the Arya Samaj had organised a political movement called "the Hindi agitation" in 1957 the real object of which was to promote feelings of enmity and hatred between the Sikh and the Hindu communities in the State of Punjab " on the ground of religion and language" to promote their prospects in the general elections to be held in 1962. and for that purpose they held meetings in the Hariana region of the Punjab and appealed to the electorate to vote for Sidhanti 'on the ground of his religion and language". and used a religious symbol-a flag called "Om Dhwaj" in, all these meetings, that the appellant himself made similar appeals to the electorate and appealed to them to refrain from voting for Daulta who was a sitting member of the House-of the, People from the constituency stating that he-Daulta--was an enemy of the Arya Samaj and of the Hindi language, that during the election campaign fifteen meetings were held between December 10, 1961- and February 18, 1962 and at all these meetings appeals were made to the electorate on the ground of religion and language of Sidhanti, and attempts were made to, promote feelings of enmity and hatred between Sikhs'and Hindus of the Punjab. Allegations about undue influence on the voters in the exercise of their free electoral right were also made in the petition, and details of these alleged corrupt practices were furnished in the schedule annexed to the petition.

Between the months of December 10, 1961 and February 18, 1962, fourteen meetings were held in the constituency as a part of the election campaign of Sidhnti. These meetings were held at Beri, Barhana, Dighal, Akheri Madanpur, Sampla, Ladpur, Majra Dubaldhan, Pakasma, Assaudha. Jhajjar, Badli Dulehra, Sisana and Bahadurgarh. There was, it is claimed by the applicant, one more meeting on February 4, 1962, at Rohtak town which is outside the Jhajjar constituency. The Tribunal held that the evidence was not sufficient to prove that in the meetings at Beri, Barhana, Dighal, Sampla, Ladpur, Pakasma. Assaudha, Jhajjar, Badli, Dulehra, Sisana and Bahadurgarh 'Om' flag was exhibited in furtherance of the election prospects of Sidhanti and with that view the High Court has agreed. The Tribunal also held that there was no reliable evidence that at Majra Dubaldhan on January 19, 1962, and at Rohtak town on February 4, 1962, 'Om' flag was used as a religious symbol. On this part of the case, however, the High Court disagreed with the Tribunal. Rohtak town was not, but Rohtak suburban area was, within the constituency in which Daulta and Sidhanti were contesting the election. Therefore the only meeting which took place within the constituency where Sidney and Daulta contested the election in which according to the High Court the Om flag was used was at Majra Dubaldhan held on January 19, 1962. Six witnesses directly spoke about the details of that meeting, beside Sidhanti. Sidhanti said generally that the evidence given by the wit- nesses for Daulta regarding what transpired at Maira Dubal- dhan and three other meetings was not true. The witnesses for Daulta were Roop Ram. Sukhi Ram and Ramdhari Balmiki. The witnesses who supported the case of the appellant were Piare Lal, Prof. Sher Singh and Jug Lal. It may be observed that the High Court placed no reliance upon the testimony of Ramdhari Balmiki and no arguments have been advanced before us suggesting that his testimony was reli- able. Roop Ram-a police constable-has deposed that about mid-day on January 19, 1962, a meeting was held at Majra Dubaldhan and that at that meeting Piare Lal sang a bhajan about the Om flag and he saw the Om flag flying on the pandal of the meeting which was attended by four to five thousand persons. According to the witness Nanhu Ram, Badlu Ram, Jagdev Singh Sidhanti, Bhagwan Dev, Ramdhani Balmiki, Attar Singh, Prof. Sher Singh and Acharya Bhagwan Dev made speeches, that Acharya Bhagwan Dev in the course of his speech asked people not to vote for Daulta but to vote for the candidate who was seeking election on the Hariana Lok Samiti ticket. In cross-examination he admitted that he had been supplied with a copy of the report which he had made to the D.I.G., C.I.D., Chandigarh, and that he had gone through the report two or three times, before he gave evidence. The Tribunal refused to place reliance upon the testimony of this witness and of another police constable Ganesh Dass who claimed to have remained present in the various political meetings. It appears that the witness had memorised the so- called reports and the same were not made available to counsel for Sidhanti to challenge the truth of the statements made by the wit- nesses. The High Court has not given any adequate reasons for accepting the testimony of the witness, when the Tribunal which had opportunity of seeing the witness and noting his demeanour had refused to accept the testimony. Sukhi Ram deposed that he was a sarpanch of Dubaldhan Panchayat for about two years, and that he was present at the meeting convened by the Hariana Lok Samiti on January 19, 1962, for canvassing votes for the candidates of Hariana Lok Samiti, that Prof. Sher Singh and Sidhanti came in a jeep on which there was flying flag with 'Om' inscribed thereon, that he saw several other vehicles flying the Om flag and that the vehicle in which he went to the meeting also was carrying the Om flag. The Tribunal was of the view that the facts elicited in the cross-examination of this witness disclosed that his recollection about other meetings which he had attended was poor, whereas his recollection about the meeting held at Majra Dubaldhan was very clear, and that the reasons given by the witness for specially remembering the details of the proceedings of the meeting in Majra Dubaldhan and not of other meetings could not be accepted. In the view of the Tribunal the witness was interested in Daulta, and this inference was supported by the fact that Daulta had sent him a copy of his election petition before it was even presented to the Election Commission. It also appears that the evidence given by this witness was inconsistent with the summary of the meeting given in Sch. 'D' to the petition and for this reason according to the Tribunal the testimony of the witness "did not carry conviction" and "it was not safe to rely upon it". The High Court after summarising the effect of the evidence observed that it did not appear from the deposition given by the witness that he was in any manner interested in Daulta. In so observing the High Court appears unfortunately to have lost sight of the grounds given by the Tribunal. Witness Piare Lal stated that he was present at the meeting held at Majra Dubaldhan and that none of the speakers suggested that the electors should vote on the ground of caste, creed, religion or language. He also stated that at none of the meetings there was any Om flag either inside or outside the pandal of the meetings. Prof. Sher Singh who was another witness examined on behalf of Sidhanti deposed that slogans shouted in the meetings were political slogans and that he did not see Om flags in any pandal of the meet- ings, and that he 'had instructed all the candidates and the members of the Hariana Lok Samiti not to use any flag or symbol other than the symbol allotted to them. Jug Lal, another witness examined on behalf of Sidhanti, stated that at the meeting at Majra Dubaldhan on January 19, 1962, there were no Om flags to be seen anywhere either inside or outside the meeting and that there were no Om flags flying on any of the vehicles. The testimony of the witnesses Piare Lal, Prof. Sher Singh and Jug Lal was discarded by the High Court, because in their view the witnesses were interested in Sidhanti. Even if this view about the evidence of these three witnesses is accepted, the evidence led on behalf of Daulta of witnesses Sukhi Ram, Ramdhari Balmiki is wholly unreliable and the testimony of police constable Roop Ram is also not such that implicit reliance can be placed upon it. We are unable, therefore, to agree with the High Court in the conclusion it has reached that it had been proved satisfactorily that Om flag was flown at Majra Dubaldhan where Sidhanti and other-. speakers delivered speeches in furtherance of the election campaign. The only other meeting at which it is found by the High Court that the Om flag was used in the meeting at Rohtak town on February 4, 1962, which town, it is common ground, is not within the Jhajjar parliamentary constituency from which Sidhanti and Daulta were contesting the election. It is, however, said that Rohtak suburban area is within the Jhajjar parliamentary constituency and a& there is a grain market in Rohtak town and a large number of voters from the Jhajjar constituency assemble in that town a meeting was held by Sidhanti in which Om flag were exhibited. The witnesses in support of the case of Daulta are Ram Nath Sapra, Dafedar Singh, K. K. Katyal and Satyavrat Bedi. The principal witnesses who were examined by Sidhanti in respect of this meeting were Piare Lal, Bharat Singh, Budh Dev, Prof. Sher Singh and Bhagwan Dev.