Hyderabad: The Telangana High Court made it clear on Thursday that the validity of the revised electoral roll cannot be examined by a court in a proceeding under Article 226 of the Constitution of India.
It said that all those aggrieved by the final publication of the electoral rolls have remedies either under Section 22 or 23 of the Representation of Peoples Act to seek amendment, transposition or deletion of any entry.
A division bench, comprising Chief Justice Alok Aradhe and Justice N.V. Shravan Kumar, was dealing with a petition filed by Mohammed Feroz Khan, Congress leader from the Nampally Assembly constituency.
Khan stated that the revised electoral list published on October 4 was full of discrepancies as regards the Nampally constituency, including having names of bogus voters, those who had moved away or had died. He contended that the names of at least 1,13,310 voters had to be deleted.
Khan’s counsel argued that his client had lost the 2018 elections by a low margin because of the bogus voters. He said that continuing with the same list in the ensuing elections would dent his client’s winning prospects, all over again. He submitted that the electoral registration officer be directed to undertake a special revision of the electoral roll of the constituency.
Avinash Desai, senior standing counsel for ECI informed the court that the chief electoral officer (CEO) has already undertaken the work of revision of the electoral rolls and had published the draft electoral rolls on August 21, wherein he called for objections, if any, from all concerned quarters. After taking into account all the claims and objections that were raised, ECI published the final electoral rolls on October 4, he said.
He informed the court that if a person is still aggrieved, he could approach under Sections 22 and 23 of the Representation of the Peoples Act, 1950.
