Judgment

GUPTA, J.:- On March 13, 1972 the First respondent was declared elected to Madhya Pradesh Legislative Assembly from Hoshangabad Constituency defeating three other contestants who are respectively respondents Nos. 2, 3 and 4. The first respondent secured 13,822 votes and respondents 2, 3 and 4 got 5,688, 970 and 12,554 votes respectively. The appellant who is an elector in the Hoshangabad constituency, filed an election petition before the High Court of Madhya Pradesh at Jabalpur seeking to have the election of the first respondent declared void alleging that the first respondent had committed various corrupt practices and also on the grounds of irregularity in the counting of votes and non-compliance with certain other provisions of the Conduct of Elections Rules, 1961 which according to the petitioner, materially affected the result of the election. According to the petitioner, on a proper counting of valid votes respondent No. 4 would have been found to have obtained the largest number of votes and he prayed that the election of the first respondent be declared void and respondent No. 4 be declared duly elected from the Hoshangabad Constituency. The High Court having dismissed the election petition, the petitioner has preferred this appeal questioning the correctness of the High Court s decision.

2. The allegations as to irregularity in the counting of votes which were pressed before us are as follows: (a) In many cases ballot papers were issued to electors without their signatures or thumb impressions being obtained on the counterfoils of the ballot papers as required by R. 38 (2) of the Conduct of Elections Rules, 1961. These votes should have been rejected as spurious under Rule 56 (2) (e)

(b) Rule 40 of the Conduct of Elections Rules, 1961 which permits a blind or infirm elector to take the help of a companion for recording his vote also provides that no person shall be permitted to act as the companion of more than one such elector at any polling station on the same day. The presiding officers are required to keep a record of all cases under this rule in Form 14A appended to these Rules. In violation of this rule the same person was allowed to act as companion for more than one such infirm voters at several polling stations. Paragraph 5 of the election petition which contained the allegation on this point was however struck off by the High Court on the ground that it was vague and lacking in material facts. The appellant questions the propriety of the order striking out the paragraph.

3. On these allegations the petitioner prayed for calling up all papers used at the polls including counterfoils of the ballot papers and statements in Form 14A to enable the petitioner to inspect the same.

4. Of the various corrupt practices alleged in the petition only two were pressed before us. One of them is that the first respondent gave a sum of Rs. 100/- to Ramayan Mandal of village Phepartal, a cultural organisation, a few days before the polling was held on March 11, 1972. It is alleged that the sum was paid by the first respondent to secure the support of the voters of that village constituting the corrupt practice of bribery mentioned in ,Section 123 (1) of the Representation of the People Act, 1951. The other allegation is that on February 26, 1972 at a public meeting held at Hoshangabad in support of the candidature of the first respondent, the Chief Minister of Madhya Pradesh stated that the father of respondent No. 4 had induced respondent No. 3, a harijan, with money to stand as a candidate at the election to deprive the first respondent of harijan votes in the constituency numbering about 12,000. This statement was false to the knowledge of both the Chief Minister and the first respondent and was made deliberately with the latter s consent to prejudice the prospects of both respondents Nos. 3 and 4. This, it is alleged, amounts to corrupt practice under Section 123 (4) of the Act. It is further alleged that in that me