Dholka polls: Gujarat High Court defers decision to produce postal ballots

Source: dnaindia.com

The Gujarat High Court on Wednesday has decided not to take a call for the time being on the plea filed by Congress leader Ashwin Rathod seeking the court’s direction to authorities to produce certain EVMs and all postal ballots of the controversial Dholka assembly election.

Rathod has challenged the assembly poll victory of education minister Bhupendrasinh Chudasama from the Dholka constituency. Chudasama had won the election by a wafer-thin margin of 327 votes, that too after the returning officer Dhaval Jani mysteriously rejected 429 votes through postal ballots — a number greater than the winning margin.

The single-judge bench of Justice Paresh Upadhyay in an order passed on Wednesday said: “Consideration of the petition needs to be deferred for the time being. This is without prejudice to the rights and contentions of the petitioner (Rathod)”.

During the hearing on Wednesday, counsel for Jani, Bhadrish Raju, opposed Rathod’s plea. He contended that no case is made out by Rathod that requires calling of the records of the election in question. The court had impleaded Jani and observer Vinita Bohra as respondents in the case after it found ‘glaring violations’ in counting of votes.

When the court asked Bohra to clarify her stand on Rathod’s plea, her counsels NK Amin and Hetu Sudarshan submitted that they have no objection if the plea of Rathod is allowed.

During the previous hearing of the case on July 30, counsel for Rathod, Percy Kavina, had argued that the postal ballots need to be reevaluated and therefore, should be called-for by the court. He had cited several Supreme Court judgments to drive home his point.

Counsel for Chudasama, ND Nanavati, countered saying that Rathod has not made out any case to call for the material in question and therefore, the plea should be rejected. Nanavati argued the prayers sought by Rathod in his plea be kept pending at this stage, which has been agreed by the court.

Meanwhile, the next hearing of the election petition filed by Rathod against Chudasama’s assembly poll victory is kept on August 21, when the latter will have to provide the examination-in-chief of the list of witnesses furnished by him for the trial in the case.