New Delhi:
The Supreme Court today said the returning officer at the center of the Chandigarh vote-tampering controversy is guilty of misconduct and deliberately attempted to distort eight ballot papers so that a BJP candidate could be elected mayor of the city.
The court has now directed to initiate contempt of court proceedings against officer Anil Masih. A show cause notice has been issued and he has been asked to file a reply in the Punjab and Haryana High Court within three weeks. The returning officer was earlier removed as a member of the BJP’s minority cell in the wake of the massive controversy over a video of tampering with ballot papers after the January 30 elections.
A bench led by Chief Justice of India DY Chandrachud said that all the eight ballot papers declared invalid by Returning Officer Anil Masih were in favor of AAP candidate and petitioner Kuldeep Kumar. The court has now ordered that Mr. Kumar will now hold the post of Mayor of Chandigarh.
“The Presiding Officer is guilty of misconduct. It is clear that the Presiding Officer has made a deliberate attempt to distort the eight ballot papers cast in favor of the petitioner so as to declare the eighth respondent as the elected candidate,” the court said. ,
The court said, Mr Masih’s conduct deserves condemnation at two levels. The court said, “Firstly, he has unlawfully changed the course of the mayoral election. Secondly, while making a serious statement before this court on February 19, the Presiding Officer expressed falsehood for which he should be held accountable “
The court’s decision against the election officer came after strong comments were made on the viral video during the hearing. Chief Justice of India DY Chandrachud had earlier termed their actions as a “mockery of democracy”. The officer was questioned in court yesterday as to why he was marking “x” on the ballot papers. He replied that the ballot papers had been mutilated and that he was marking them so that they could be identified.
This morning, the video was played again in the Supreme Court and the bench held that the ballot papers were not defaced.
Shri Masih had declared eight votes in support of the AAP mayoral candidate invalid. This ensured the victory of the BJP candidate, even though the party got fewer votes than the AAP-Congress alliance.
The court order also puts to rest speculations that the BJP, which had recently planned to make three AAP councilors switch sides, might eventually succeed in taking over the Chandigarh civic body. The change meant that in the event of re-election, the BJP would get more votes than the AAP-Congress alliance. However, the court refused to order re-election, observing that horse-trading was a serious matter.
