Single judge order on poll contestant upheld

The Bench of Justices S Vaidyanathan and A A Nakkiran gave the ruling while dismissing a writ appeal from the Tamil Nadu Home Secretary, the DGP and the Kancheepuram SP challenging the order of the single judge dated December 16, 2020, which upheld the candidature of E Sugumar.

Chennai:Holding that registering a criminal case on the basis of a wordy quarrel in a family and its settlement through compromise cannot be treated as a serious crime to debar a candidate from contesting elections, a Division Bench of the Madras High Court has upheld an order of a single judge, which quashed an order of the authority concerned rejecting the candidature of the individual.

The Bench of Justices S Vaidyanathan and A A Nakkiran gave the ruling while dismissing a writ appeal from the Tamil Nadu Home Secretary, the DGP and the Kancheepuram SP challenging the order of the single judge dated December 16, 2020, which upheld the candidature of E Sugumar.

The charge against Sugumar was that he had failed to disclose information about the criminal case in the application filed in 2019. He had suppressed the fact and attracted disqualification, it was alleged.

Following settlement of the case through compromise, the case registered in 2015 was dismissed in 2016 and Sugumar was given a honourable acquittal. Hence, he did not mention the same in his election papers.

Dismissing the appeal, the Bench pointed out that on the date of application, there was no criminal case pending against Sugumar and the family dispute, which culminated into a criminal case, was amicably settled. The single judge had considered all these aspects and granted the relief to Sugumar.

Considering the totality of the circumstances, the Bench said it was in complete agreement with the views taken by the single judge and was not inclined to interfere with his order, and dismissed the appeal.

PTI