Impossible to define misuse of religion in electioneering: SC

Legal Correspondent

New Delhi, October 27

A seven-member Constitution Bench of the Supreme Court today made it clear that it was impossible to define parameters for determining the violations of the ban on seeking votes in the name of religion, caste, race or language and as such it would not be issuing any guidelines on the issue.

“We will restrict ourselves to the question of whether the candidate should not seek vote in the name of only his religion or in the name of any religion” and those coming within the ambit of the ban, the Bench headed by Chief Justice TS Thakur clarified. The other members of the Bench are Justices MB Lokur, SA Bobde, AK Goel, UU Lalit, DY Chandrachud and LN Rao.

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The Bench made the remark while hearing arguments by senior counsel Indira Jaising for three interveners, including social activist Teesta Setalvad.

The Bench also said the contesting candidates could not be disqualified for merely making a reference to a religion. The “permissible limit” would depend on what was said, the context and the tone and tenor. These aspects could be gone into only on a case-to-case basis, it explained.

It said it did not want to expand the scope of the references made to it by smaller Benches by venturing into areas which were difficult to be dealt with.

Jaising pleaded that she was also against a blanket ban on reference to any religion in a poll campaign. But the court should draw a line between what was permissible and what would amount to exceeding the limit.

Meanwhile, another Bench headed by Justice Anil Dave deferred hearing of a petition challenging the election of Congress president to the Lok Sabha in 2014 from Rae Bareli for allegedly holding two citizenships and playing the communal card to get Muslim votes.

The petitioner Ramesh Singh has approached the SC following the dismissal of his PIL by the Allahabad High Court on July 11.

The Bench said it would await the ruling by the seven-member Constitution Bench which was hearing a batch of petitions pertaining to disqualification or non-disqualification of MPs and MLAs on the charge of seeking votes in the name of subjects banned under the Representation of People Act 1951.