IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB AND HARYANA AT CHANDIGARH Date of Decision: 13.01.2025 Manpreet Sirswa -Petitioner Versus Jai Parkash and others -Respondents CORAM: HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE ANOOP CHITKARA Present Mr. Rajiv Malhotra, Advocate for the petitioner.

****

ANOOP CHITKARA, J. (ORAL)

1. Seeking setting aside of the election of the 04-Hisar Parliamentary Constituency where respondent No.1 Jai Parkash was elected as member of Parliament where result was declared on 04.06.2024, and further to order a fresh election for the same and initiating proceedings under Section 8A of the Representation of People Act, 1951 for disqualifying the elected member of Parliament i.e. respondent No.1 for six years from contesting any election, for having committed a corrupt practice, the petitioner came up before this Court by filing the present Election petition under Sections 80-83 read with Section 100, 123(2) read with Section

8A of the Representation of the People Act, 1951 and all other enabling provisions.

2. The relevant portion of S. 86 Representation of the People Act, 1951, hereinafter referred to as RPA, reads as follows:

86. Trial of election petitions.—

(1) The High Court shall dismiss an election petition which does not comply with the provisions of section 81 or section 82 or section 117.

Explanation.—An order of the High Court dismissing an election petition under this sub-section shall be deemed to be an order made under clause (a) of section 98.

(2) As soon as may be after an election petition has been presented to the High Court, it shall be referred to the Judge or one of the Judges who has or have been assigned by the Chief Justice for the trial of election petitions under sub-section (2) of section 80A.

(3) Where more election petitions than one are presented to the High Court in respect of the same election, all of them shall be referred for trial to the same Judge who may, in his discretion, try them separately or in one or more groups.

3. Two separate Election Petitions were filed challenging the election of 04-Hisar Parliamentary Constituency. The said petitions were registered as EP-3 of 2024 and EP-4 of

2024.

4. Vide order dated 08.08.2024, Hon’ble the Chief Justice of this Court had assigned and referred both these petitions to this Court.

5. In para no.1 of the election petition, the petitioner claims that he is currently a cabinet minister in the Government of Haryana, and even earlier, he was a minister in the Haryana Government from 1987 to 1990 and was elected as a member of Rajya Sabha in 1990 and was elected as a member of the Haryana Legislative Assembly in 1987 and 2019. He also claimed that he contested as a candidate of the Bhartiya Janta Party from 04-Hisar Parliamentary Constituency in the 2024 General Elections and, therefore, is qualified under Section 81 of the Representation of People Act, 1951 and fully entitled to file the present election petition against the respondent challenging his election from 04-Hisar Parliamentary Constituency. In para no.3 of the election petition, the petitioner reiterates his statement that he had filed his nomination from 04- Hisar Parliamentary Constituency as a candidate of the Bhartiya Janta Party, whereas the respondent No.1 filed his nomination from the same constituency as a candidate of the Indian National Congress on 06.05.2024. Although there are 30 respondents per the memo of parties, the petitioner did not specify which respondent had won the election. To ascertain that, reference is made to para no.8 of the election petition in which respondent No.1, who had got the highest vote, had contested from the Indian National Congress. In row no.2, the candidate of the BJP is named Ranjit Singh and not the petitioner, Manpreet Sirswa.

It will be appropriate to extract para no.8 of the election petition, which reads as follows:-

6. Perusal of the above clearly indicates that the petitioner’s name does not appear in the candidate list. A perusal of the entire election petition does no