Haryana Congress approaches Election Commission over ‘illegalities’ in RS poll

The Haryana Congress on Monday gave a representation to the Election Commission of India (EC) regarding alleged illegalities in the conduct of Rajya Sabha election for two seats in the State recently, accusing the Returning Officer, Pankaj Aggarwal, of conducting himself in a “totally illegal and partial manner” and seeking a probe into his alleged misconduct.

‘Count rejected votes’

Demanding that all four illegally rejected votes be counted in the account of the party’s Rajya Sabha candidate Karamvir Singh Boudh, the letter said the Returning Officer “arbitrarily and illegally rejected the votes cast by certain MLAs belonging to the Indian National Congress in apparent violation of the prescribed procedure for acceptance and rejection of ballot papers under the applicable rules”.

After high political drama around midnight on March 16, the Bharatiya Janata Party’s Sanjay Bhatia and Mr. Boudh were elected to the Rajya Sabha. However, with Mr. Boudh only managing to secure 28 votes and winning by just one vote despite 37 MLAs in the Assembly, what looked like an easy win for Congress turned into a nail-biting finish. Five party MLAs cross-voted for independent Satish Nandal, while four Congress ballots were declared invalid during counting. Officials said five votes were declared invalid – four of the Congress and one of the BJP.

The five-page representation on Monday was signed by former Chief Minister and Leader of the Opposition Bhupinder Singh Hooda, along with the State president Rao Narender Singh, Mr. Boudh and two MLAs.

Referring to the case of MLA Paramvir Singh, whose vote was declared invalid on the ground of violation of secrecy, the letter pointed out that “he did not violate secrecy and did not show his vote to anyone except the authorised agent of the INC”.

The letter also accused the Returning Officer of illegality in the counting process, disregard of valid objections and electoral misconduct.

In an interaction with the media persons following a Congress Legislature Party meeting in Delhi earlier in the day, Mr. Hooda said the party would even move the Punjab and Haryana High Court in this connection if required. “Our votes were valid. They were forcibly declared invalid,” maintained Mr. Hooda, in reply to a question on the action against the MLAs casting invalid votes.

Notice to MLAs

On the five MLAs who have been served show-cause notices by the party for alleged cross-voting, Mr. Rao Narender Singh said the matter was under the consideration of the party’s State disciplinary committee. “The disciplinary committee is meeting on April 3 to hear the five MLAs’ side of the story. After that, they will send their recommendations to the party high command, and a final decision will be made later,” he said.

Three of the five MLAs have replied to the show-cause notice.