Judgment

WANCHOO, J. : This is an appeal on a, certificate granted by the Rajasthan High Court and arises in the following circumstances. There was an election to the Rajasthan Legislative Assembly from the Beawar constituency at the general election in 1962. A number of persons stood for election, two of whom were the appellant and the respondent. The appellant secured the highest number of votes while the respondent came second. The appellant was declared successful at the election and this led to an election petition by the respondent.

2. A number of grounds were taken in the election petition for invalidating the election of the appellant, but in the present appeal we are concerned with one ground and shall refer to that only. That ground was that the appellant had committed a corrupt practice as defined in Section 123 (4) of the Representation of the People Act, No. 43 of 1951, (hereinafter referred to as the Act). The case of the respondent was that the appellant had published a statement of fact in relation to the respondent s personal character or conduct and that statement of fact was false, and the appellant either believed it to be false or did not believe it to be true. T