SHAN ALI alias SHAN KHAN vs Ch. MUHAMMAD AKRAM and others
This petition for leave to appeal is directed against the judgment of the Lahore High Court dismissing the petitioner's writ petition regarding a local government election dispute. The petitioner and respondent No. 1 contested the election for membership of the Municipal Committee Kasur, and the petitioner was initially declared the winner. Respondent No. 1 challenged the election through an election petition alleging improper rejection and acceptance of votes. The Election Tribunal initially dismissed the petition, but upon a constitutional petition, the High Court remanded the matter for recounting. Upon recounting, respondent No. 1 was declared successful. The petitioner challenged this before the High Court, alleging tampering of the election record. The High Court inspected the record, concluded there was no tampering, and upheld the Election Tribunal's order. The Supreme Court evaluated the arguments that the petitioner's applications were arbitrarily dismissed and held that since the High Court itself conducted an inquiry and verified the integrity of the record, no ground for interference was made out. The petition was accordingly dismissed.
- Whether the High Court can examine election records and conduct an inquiry to satisfy itself regarding allegations of tampering?
- Does an order of the Election Tribunal following a court-ordered recount warrant interference when the High Court has verified the integrity of the election material?
ORDER
1. ' JAVID IQBAL, J.--This petition for leave to appeal is directed against the judgment of the Lahore High Court Lahore dated 22 January 1989 whereby writ petition of the petitioner was dismissed.
2. ' Briefly the facts are that the petitioner and respondent No,1 contested election for membership of Municipal Committee Kasur from Electoral Unit No,28 held on 30th November 1987. The petitioner was declared elected. Thereupon respondent No,1 challenged his election by way of election petition alleging that the Presiding Officer had illegally rejected his valid votes and wrongly accepted invalid votes of the petitioner. In the course of the hearing recounting of votes was sought. However, the Election Tribunal dismissed the petition whereupon respondent No,1 challenged his order before the Lahore High Court. By way of writ petition and the case was remanded to the Election Tribunal with the direction to recount the votes and then to decide the case on the basis of the result of his count. When the matter was reheard the petitioner filed different applications one after the other stating that the election record had been tampered with and that therefore the election material be opened in the presence of the Presiding Officer. He also filed an application requesting that the record of double lock of the male polling booth be summoned. He likewise alleged that the seals on the bags containing the election material were broken. The Election Tribunal dismissed all these applications as they were not supported by any evidence. Then it undertook to recount the votes and as a result respondent No,1 was declared successful as he was found to have obtained 27 votes more than the petitioner. This order of the Election Tribunal was challenged by the petitioner before the High Court by way of writ petition. The High Court summoned the election record. Sealed bags containing the election material were opened and the ballot papers were examined. After examining the entire record and also considering the allegations of the petitioner the High Court arrived at the conclusion that the election record had not been tampered with. According to the inquiry of the High Court the Secretary Union Council had produced the record before the Election Tribunal who took the record from the office of the District Accounts Officer in the presence of both the parties. Eventually it was on this finding of fact that the learend Division Bench held that the order of the Election Tribunal did not call for any interference.
3. Learned counsel for the petitioner before us attempted to argue that the applications of the petitioner had been arbitrarily dismissed and that the Election Tribunal should have held inquiry.
4. But in the instant case the High Court itself held the inquiry and arrived at the conclusion that the order passed by the Election Tribunal was unexceptionable. There is therefore no ground made out for interference. This petition is accordingly dismissed.