The Bombay Excessive Courtroom on Thursday dismissed an election petition by Shiv Sena (UBT) chief Amol Kirtikar which sought to cancel the victory of Shiv Sena (Eknath Shinde faction) candidate Ravindra Waikar within the Lok Sabha elections from the Mumbai North West constituency.
A single-judge bench of Justice Sandeep V Marne, which concluded listening to and reserved its verdict on December 11, rejected Kirtikar’s claims. Kirtikar, who misplaced by a margin of 48 votes to Waikar, had alleged lack of transparency and lapses by the officers of the Election Fee, claiming he was not permitted to file an utility for recounting of votes.
He additionally alleged that EC officers allowed using cell phones contained in the counting space and let impersonators forged 333 tendered votes. Tendered votes are forged when a voter finds that one other individual has already voted in his/her identify. Such tendered votes are submitted utilizing Type 17-B and recorded on poll paper.
Kirtikar’s plea claimed, “Petitioner is aggrieved as a result of improper reception of void votes forged by 333 impersonators rather than real electors, together with breach of guidelines/orders, pertaining to the counting course of, by EC officers, which has materially affected the result of the election outcomes resulting in the petitioner’s defeat by a slender margin of forty-eight (48) votes, regardless of getting a complete of 4,52,596 votes (4,51,095 EVM votes + 1,501 postal poll votes).”
“The high-handed hastiness and palpable arbitrariness on the a part of the Returning Officer will also be seen from the act that she fully ignored provisions of the 2023 Handbook, which gives for a candidate’s proper to file for a second recount, notably when the margin between the primary two candidates are slender. Within the current case, there couldn’t have been a narrower margin than 1 vote,” Kirtikar claimed via advocate Amit A Karande.
Nonetheless, senior advocate Anil Y Sakhare for Waikar argued that Kirtikar’s plea lacked benefit and sought its dismissal, stating that the petitioner failed to point out how the tendered votes favoured the successful candidate.
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