Amendment of petition granted by Tribunal.

This is an application for the issue of a writ of Prohibition directing the Election Tribunal, Tirunelveli, not to proceed with the hearing of Election Petition No.71 of 1952. At an election held on 16th January, 1952, the petitioner A.S. Subbaraj was returned to the Legislative Assembly, Madras, from the Uttamapalayam Constituency. The first respondent Muthiah, who was one of the three unsuccessful candidates for the seat, filed on 27th March, 1952, a petition under section 81 of the Representation of the People Act, hereinafter referred to as the Act, for setting aside the election. The Election Commission to which it was presented appointed under section 86 of the Act an Election Tribunal for the hearing of this petition. Notice of the same was served on the petitioner on 28th September, 1952. On 22nd October, 1952, when the petition came up for hearing before the Election Tribunal the petitioner raised a preliminary objection to its maintainability on the ground that it was not duly verified as required by section 83 of the Representation of the People Act, 1950, and was, therefore liable to be rejected in limini under section 85 of the Act. Section 83(1) of the Act runs as follows:

"An election petition shall contain a concise statement of the material facts on which the petitioner relies and shall be signed by the petitioner and verified in the manner laid down in the Code of Civil Procedure, 1908 (Act V of 1908), for the verification of pleadings."

The provision of the Civil Procedure Code relating to verification is Order 6, and rule 15, which is as follows:

Order 6, rule 15(1): Save as otherwise provided by any law for the time being in force, every pleading shall be verified at the foot by the party or by one of the parties pleading or by some other person proved to the satisfaction of the Court to be acquainted with the facts of the case.

(2) The person verifying shall specify, by reference to the numbered paragraphs of the pleading, what he verifies of his own knowledge and what he verifies upon information received and believed to be true.

(3) The verification shall be signed by the person making it and shall state the date on which it was signed."

In the present case the petition was verified. But the verification stated generally that the facts mentioned therein were true to the knowledge and information of the petitioner. It did not specify what he verified of his own knowledge and what upon information received and believed to be true. Nor did the verification state when and where it was signed. It did not, therefore, comply with the prescriptions laid down in Order 6, rule 15, of the Civil Procedure Code. Section 85 of the Act provides that:

“if the provisions of section 81, section 83, or section 117 are not complied with, the Election Commission shall dismiss the petition”.

Basing himself on the language of sections 83 and 85 of the Act the petitioner herein urged before the Election Tribunal that the Election Petition was liable to be dismissed in limine for failure to comply with the requirements of Order 6, rule 15 and that there was no jurisdiction in the Tribunal to hear the petition. To meet this objection, the respondent Muthiah filed on 3rd November, 1952, an application for permission to amend the verification so as to bring it in conformity with the prescriptions laid down in Order 6, rule 15. That was C.M.P.No.1 of 1952. It was opposed by the petitioner herein on the ground that the Tribunal had no power to direct amendment of the petition and that under section 90(4) of the Act it had no option but to dismiss it. Both these contentions were overruled by the Election Tribunal which held that section 90(4) gave it a discretion in the matter of dismissing the Election Petition for non-compliance with section 83 and that it had also the power to permit amendment of the petition. It is against this order that the present application for the issue of a writ of Prohibition has been filed.

In this Court