A bench of Justices DY Chandrachud and Surya Kant said that such an order which amounts to verifying the sanctity and correctness of the election results, can be passed only in an election petition and not in a public interest litigation petition.
“Once results are declared, this becomes an election petition without actually an election petition. Booth capturing etc are grounds for a challenge in the election petition, not under this jurisdiction Mr Patwalia [counsel for the Respondent]. The High Court cannot collect the evidence in PIL,” the bench remarked.
The Court was hearing an appeal filed by the West Bengal State Election Commission against an order of the Calcutta High Court passed on April 26, which directed a forensic audit of the CCTV footage from the Contai Municipal elections on allegations that the polling saw incidents of violence and malpractices.
The High Court bench of Chief Justice Prakash Shrivastava and Justice Rajarshi Bharadwaj had found that in spite of its efforts, a free and fair elections were not held to the Contai Municipality in south Bengal.
While the Division Bench acknowledged that the election of a municipality could not be called in question except by way of an election petition, at this stage the bench was only attempting to ascertain if the assurance of free and fair elections previously given by the State Election Commission had been fulfilled.
Therefore, the State Election Commission was directed to send the CCTV footage of Contai Municipal Election for forensic audit to the Central Forensic Science Laboratory (CFSL) within 10 days.
The High Court had also stated that such a direction would not amount to interference with the election process but would, in fact, further the object of the State Election Commission to hold free and fair elections.
This led to the present appeal before the top court.
Source: Barandbench
