JUDGMENT :

Sunita Agarwal, J.

1. Heard Sri Anil Kishore Sharma learned Senior Advocate assisted by Sri Saroj Kumar Yadav learned counsel for the petitioner, Sri Rakesh Pande learned Senior Advocate assisted by Sri Ashutosh Mishra learned counsel for the Election Commission of India and Sri J.N. Maurya learned Chief Standing Counsel for the State respondents.

2. By means of the present writ petition, the petitioner herein seeks to challenge the notice dated 18.5.2022 issued by the respondent no. 4 namely the Sub-Divisional Magistrate, Sirathu, Kaushambi as also the reminder notices dated 25.5.2022 and 3.6.2022 issued by him. The prayer is to quash the entire proceedings initiated by the respondents with the aforesaid notices.

3. The brief facts of the case are that the petitioner herein is an elected representative of the people to the State assembly, Member of Legislative Assembly of the State, from the Constituency No. 251, Sirathu, District Kaushambi. In the elections notified on 1.2.2022, the petitioner herein had filed her nomination paper on 8.2.2022, polling took place on 27.2.2022 and in the result declared on 10.3.2022, the petitioner herein was returned as a winner.

4. It is stated in the writ petition that during the nomination process, certain objections were raised alleging suppression of material facts by the petitioner as required to be declared in Form-26, the affidavit submitted along with the nomination paper, describing her criminal antecedents. The contention is that the Returning Officer had examined the documents filed by the petitioner in light of the complaint and turning down the complaint, accepted the nomination papers as valid. The petitioner having won the election, took oath of the Member of Legislative Assembly in the house of Legislature and participated in the Budget Session in the fall of May, 2022.

5. It seems that an undated complaint was filed by a resident of the constituency namely Sirathu, alleging that the right of the ordinary voter of the constituency has been infringed as the petitioner did not disclose the criminal cases lodged against her in the affidavit appended with the nomination paper. The undated complaint filed by one Dileep Singh Patel was followed by another complaint of one Omkar Nath Gautam. Both the complaints are appended as Annexure 4' to the writ petition.

On these complaints, the notices impugned have been issued by the Sub-Divisional Magistrate, Sirathu, District Kaushambi. It is stated that two previous notices issued in the month of May were not served upon the petitioner and only after the service of the third notice dated 3.6.2022, she came to know about the said complaints. It is also stated in the writ petition that the Sub-Divisional Magistrate, Sirathu, District Kaushambi made an enquiry about the genuineness of the complaint and in the report submitted by the Revenue Lekhpal, Kshetra Nara, Sirathu, it was indicated that three persons in the name of Dileep Patel were met in the village. They were Dileep Singh Patel son of Indra Pal Singh, Dileep Singh son of late Ram Sewak Singh and Dileep Kumar Singh son of Sri Ram Singh, all residents of village Udahin Khurd, Sirathu, District Kaushambi and these three persons filed notarized affidavits before the District Magistrate/the District Election Officer that they did not file any complaint. The affidavits are appended as Annexure 7' to the writ petition.

A perusal of the copy of the complaint made by the complainant Sri Dileep Patel indicates that he did not disclose his parentage and it is not possible to identify him from the description therein.

6. It is brought on record of the writ petition that the Election Commission of India by a communication dated 17th May, 2022 had forwarded the complaint lodged by Dileep Patel with the direction that appropriate proceeding be initiated in the matter in light of the circular dated 24th August, 2021 issued by it. On receipt of the same, by the letter dated 26th May, 2022, the Ch