High Court assured of videography of Chandigarh Mayor election process

Saurabh Malik

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Chandigarh, January 17

The UT Administration today assured the Punjab and Haryana High Court of videography during the mayoral poll just hours before the election. The Bench of Justice Deepak Sibal and Justice Deepak was also assured that the Chandigarh Police would leave no stone unturned to ensure free and fair elections scheduled to be held on Thursday.

The Bench was hearing a petition filed by Kuldeep Kumar through counsel Gaurav Garg Dhuriwala, RPS Bara and Ferry Sofat for issuance of a direction to UT Deputy Commissioner to ensure free and fair elections to the posts of Mayor, Senior Deputy Mayor and Deputy Mayor of the Municipal Corporation. Directions were also sought for appointment of a court commissioner to supervise the election process.

After arguing the matter for some time, the counsel for the petitioner submitted he had expressed instructions from the petitioner not to press the prayers. He would be satisfied if the present petition was disposed of by issuing directions to the official respondents to acknowledge acceptance of withdrawal of candidature by Jasbir Singh for the Mayor’s post, Neha for Senior Deputy Mayor’s post and Poonam for Deputy Mayor’s post.

He also asked for directions to the official respondents to issue passes to the persons nominated by the contesting candidates, who could then watch the proceedings and declare the list of eligible candidates well in time. He further prayed for issuance of appropriate directions to the official respondents to video-graph the entire voting/election process.

During the hearing, UT senior standing counsel Anil Mehta argued that there was no need for the high court to issue alternative directives. The official respondents duly acknowledged the withdrawal of candidature by Jasbir Singh, Neha and Poonam. They would issue passes and publish the list of eligible candidates “as per the due process in accordance with law”. Mehta further submitted that the official respondents like earlier would also be conducting videography of the entire voting/election process. UT Public Prosecutor Munish Bansal assured the court on behalf of the police.

“In the light of the fair stand taken by the respondents, no further orders are required to be passed,” the Bench concluded.