HIMA KOHLI, J.

I.A. No. 1354/2016 (by the petitioner under Order XII Rule 6 CPC)

1. The petitioner has invoked the provisions of Order XII Rule 6 CPC and prays that the Election Petition be allowed and the election of the respondent No. 1, as a MLA from Constituency-38, Delhi Cantt. in the General Elections to the Legislative Assembly of NCT of Delhi held in February, 2015, be set aside on the ground that sufficient admissions have been made by him for this Court to pass a judgment on admissions.

2. In the accompanying Election Petition filed under Sections 100(1)(d)(i), (iii), (iv), 101, 84 and 125A(ii) of the Representation of the People Act, 1951 (hereinafter referred to as the R.P. Act) read with Article 329(B) of the Constitution of India, the petitioner has challenged the election of the respondent No. 1 on several counts. One of the grounds that forms the basis of the present application which as per the petitioner, has been admitted by the respondent No. 1 in his reply, is that at the time of filing his nomination papers, in his affidavit dated 19.01.2015, he had furnished incorrect information with regard to his educational qualification to the effect that he is a B.A. in 2012 from Sikkim University which is a gross misrepresentation. The petitioner contends that by doing so, the respondent No. 1 has successfully exercised undue influence over the voters, which act amounts to a corrupt practice within the meaning of Section 123 of the R.P. Act. The aforesaid assertions have been made by the petitioner in paras 6(b), 8 and 10 of the Election Petition.

3. The petitioner has averred in para 6(b)(v) of the Election Petition that his associate had submitted an application dated 24.3.2015 under the RTI Act to the Sikkim University to gather information about the educational qualifications of the respondent No. 1. Vide reply dated 26.03.2015, Sikkim University had informed the applicant that as per the academic record of the year 2014-2015 and all the past academic years, they had no student by the name of Shri Surender Singh (respondent No. 1 herein), who had registered for the course of Bachelor of Arts (B.A.) in any Department of the University or its affiliated colleges.

4. In his counter affidavit, the respondent No. 1 has denied the allegation that he has taken any undue advantage of the electorate and submitted that he had not graduated from Sikkim University but from EIILM University, Sikkim and due to an inadvertent typographical error, the name of the former University had been mentioned in his affidavit. A similar submission has been made by the respondent No. 1 in paras 6(b)(v) and 7 of the counter affidavit.

5. Referring to the averments made by the respondent No. 1 in his counter affidavit, as noted above and claiming that he has admitted to furnishing incorrect information with regard to his educational qualification in the statutory affidavit required to be filed alongwith his nomination papers, the petitioner has filed the present application stating inter-alia that the said nomination paper was liable to be rejected by the Returning Officer, for the reason that it is not in compliance with Sections 33 and 33A of the R.P. Act and was improperly accepted. In this background, the petitioner prays that a judgment on admission be passed on the basis of admissions made by the respondent No. 1 and his election be set aside as null and void.

6. To buttress his argument that furnishing of false and incorrect information with regard to his educational status in the statutory affidavit filed by the respondent No. 1 alongwith his nomination, amounts to a corrupt practice within the meaning of Section 123 of the R.P. Act, Mr. P.D. Gupta, learned Senior Advocate appearing for the petitioner has cited the following decisions:-

(i) Jyoti Basu and Others vs. Debi Ghosal and Others, (1982) 1 SCC 691

(ii) Sri Mairembam Prithviraj @ Prithviraj Singh vs. Shri Pukhrem Sharatchandra Singh, 2016 (10) SCALE 403

(iii) Nand Kishore G