The
Delhi High Court on Monday pointed out several mistakes in AAP leader Somnath
Bharti's petition challenging BJP MP Bansuri Swaraj's election in the 2024 Lok
Sabha polls on grounds of alleged corrupt practices, and asked him to file a
corrected one.
Justice
Manmeet PS Arora said at the outset that there were a lot of typographical
errors which made it difficult to understand the averments in the petition.
Even the reference to respondents in the petition
did not correlate with the respondents mentioned in the memo of parties and
synopsis, the counsel said.
The
court gave Bharti 10 days to file a corrected petition and listed the matter
for further hearing on August 14.
When
Bharti's counsel urged the court to issue notice to the respondents on the
petition, the judge said, "There are too many mistakes. Correct the
petition first. I can't issue notice like this. I will simply adjourn it. Please
file a corrected petition."
Both
Bharti and Swaraj contested from the New Delhi Lok Sabha seat.
While
Bharti secured 3,74,815 votes, Swaraj got 4,53,185 votes as per the returning
officer, the plea said.
The petition, filed under under Section 80 and 81 of
the Representation of the People Act, alleged corrupt practices by Swaraj, her
election agent and other persons.
The
plea also alleged that former AAP minister Raaj Kumar Anand contested the
election on a Bahujan Samaj Party ticket to help Swaraj by cutting into the
vote share. Later, on July 10, he joined the BJP, the plea said.
It
said Anand was a minister in the Aam Aadmi Party government in Delhi and was
active in campaigning for Bharti till April 9 and suddenly resigned from the
party on April 10.
On
election day, the petitioner was shocked during his visits to booths across the
constituency to see that Swaraj's booth agents had pamphlets displaying her
ballot number, photo, election symbol and photograph of Prime Minister Narendra
Modi and "was showing the same to the voters who had lined up in the booth
to vote and asking them to vote for Ballot no.1", the plea claimed.
"...such an act certainly qualifies to be a corrupt practice. This
was also reported to the respondent no. 3 (returning officer) but all in
vain," it alleged.