Election petitions require prompt adjudication to prevent the prolonged occupation of public office by improperly elected representatives. Procedural violations in ballot validation and counting records, if they materially influence the result, necessitate judicial intervention to declare the correct outcome and uphold the integrity of the franchise.

ORDER :

G.JAYACHANDRAN, J.

1.Heard Mr.A.E.Ravichandran, Learned Counsel for the Election Petitioner and Mr.N.C.Ashok Kumar, Learned Counsel for the 1^st respondent. For the respondents 9 to 12, there was no representation.

2. In continuation of the earlier order passed by this Court in E.P.No. 2 of 2016, dated 01.10.2019, this Court passes the following order to give logical end to the litigation that has been pending for almost a decade.

3. The term ‘unfortunate’ may not be an adequate expression to describe the present case since in view of this Court, a grave mockery of justice, under the guise of dispensing justice been committed to the people of India, particularly the voters of No.228 Radhapuram Assembly Constituency, Tirunelveli District, who were forced to bear a person as their Assembly representative though he is not duly elected.

4. In short to recap, the Election Petitioner-Mr.M.Appavu lost to the 1^st respondent-Mr.I.S.Inbadurai, as per the declaration made by the Returning Officer, by a margin of 49 votes. The Election Petitioner contended that valid votes cast in his favour been wrongly rejected and, therefore, there must be recount.

5. The said petition was opposed on the ground that 203 Postal Ballots were found to be invalid, since they were attested by Headmasters of Middle Schools, who are not Gazetted Officers, whereas the election rules mandate that Postal Ballots must be attested by Gazetted Officers.

6. The 1^st respondent, who was declared as elected candidate, initially filed an application to reject the petition, which was dismissed by this Court. Against the dismissal of the said petition, he preferred an appeal before the Hon’ble Supreme Court and got it dismissal as withdrew after 14 months. Subsequently, the case was assigned to this Court by the then Hon’ble Chief Justice of Madras High Court. This Court commenced the trial. Completed the recording of evidence by examining the witnesses and passed the following order on 24.09.2019, which reflects the facts in nutshell:-

“This Election Petition is filed by the candidate, who has lost the election by 49 votes.

2. The specific allegations in the election petition is that after completion of 18^th round of counting, the petitioner was leading by 1300 votes. The 1^st respondent who belongs to the party which was leading in the general election with connivance of the Returning Officer manipulated the election process boosted up the votes secured by the 1^st respondent and also invalidated the postal ballots duly attested by the Headmaster of the Middle School on the flimsy reason that they are not Gazetted Officer.

3. After counter, this Court framed triable issues and witnesses were summoned. The petitioner examined himself as PW1 besides his agent Adhi Paramasivan as PW.2. Ex.P1 to Ex.P7 marked. The present Returning Officer (i/c) and Returning Officer who conducted the election were summoned and examined as CW1 and CW2. The Form 17C annexed for Conduct of Election Rules, 1961, were marked as Ex.C1 to Ex.C3 through CW1. The said form contains two parts. Part I carries details about the counting of votes recorded and Part II contains the result of counting. Ex.C1 to Ex.C3 relate to rounds 19, 20 and 21 of the said election. In this form the Returning Officer who was examined as CW2 admits that he has not filled Part II, in alternate he has prepared those details in replica of it separately and obtained the signature of the respective candidates/ election agent/ counting agent and they were kept in a separate sealed cover. It is also depo