Rejection Of Municipal Election Nomination Can Be Challenged Only Through Election Petition: Rajasthan High Court
The Rajasthan High Court has dismissed a petition challenging rejection of Petitioner's nomination papers for the election of Ward Member, Municipal Board Brij Nagar, District Deeg, opining that as per the bar under Article 243-ZG, no election to any municipality could be called into question except by filing an Election Petition,
The bench of Justice Anoop Kumar Dhand held that as per Section 31, of the Rajasthan Municipalities Act, 2009 (“the Act”), improper rejection or acceptance of nomination paper was a ground to declare elections void, and as per the statutory bar under Article 243-ZG, the Court did not have jurisdiction to examine the petition.
For context, the petitioner had challenged the order of the Returning Officer by which his nomination papers for the election of Ward Member were rejected on the ground of a pending criminal case against him and non-disclosure of this fact by the petitioner.
It was the case of the petitioner that his nomination was rejected without providing any opportunity of hearing and hence was violative of the principles of natural justice.
After hearing the contentions, the Court referred to the Supreme Court case of N.P. Ponnuswami v. Returning Officer, Namakkal Constituency and Ors. which held that “election” embraced the whole procedure and not just the final result, hence, the rejection and acceptance of nomination form was also included in the term “election”.
In this background, the Court observed that,
“Legislature has placed improper rejection and improper acceptance of nomination on the same footing and these grounds are very much available under Section 31 of the Act of 2009 for declaring the election to be void. Hence, it is clear from the bare reading of the above provisions that the petitioner can file an election petition in terms of the provisions contained under Section 31 of the Act of 2009.”
Accordingly, the petition was disposed of with liberty granted to the petitioner for filing an election petition.
Title: Kanhaiya Lal v State Election Commission & Ors.
Citation: 2026 LiveLaw (Raj) 388