A Delhi Court yesterday directed the Delhi Police to file a fresh action taken report on a plea seeking registration of FIR against officials of the Election Commission of India (ECI) over alleged irregularities in electoral rolls and misuse of public funds.

Judicial Magistrate First Class Kautuk Bhardwaj of Patiala House Courts passed the order while dealing with a plea filed by lawyer Mehmood Pracha last year.

The complaint seeks registration of FIR against Chief Electoral Officers, Electoral Registration Officers, Assistant EROs, Booth Level Officers and officials of the Election Commission.

The plea alleges that there was deliberate non-enrolment of eligible voters, retention of duplicate entries, facilitation of bogus voting and siphoning or misappropriation of funds earmarked for electoral-roll preparation.

As the matter was listed yesterday for arguments on application under Section 175(3) of BNSS, Pracha filed a reply to the action taken report filed by the Delhi Police.

The Court was informed that Pracha did not get an opportunity to present his evidence to the Investigating Officer. Thus, considering that an action taken report could not have been filed without conducting preliminary inquiry or examination of the complainant, the judge deemed it appropriate to seek a fresh report from the IO.

“Issue notice to IO concerned with direction to file fresh ATR, after examining the complainant and the evidence, if any, supplied by the complainant…,” the Court said.

The matter is now listed on November 17.

The complaint seeks action against the officials for the offences including criminal breach of trust by a public servant, cheating, forgery of public records and criminal conspiracy, as well as other offences under the Representation of the People Act.

Counsel for Complainant: Nikhil Guliani and Vishal Khokhar, Advocates

Click here to read order