RAM JIWAN SINGH Vs. SIS RAM

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The appellant contested unsuccessfully the election to Haryana Vidhan Sabha from Pataudi Constituency held in March 1972. Poll was taken on March 11, 1972, counting took place the next day i. e. March 12 following which the first respondent was declared elected. The appellant presented an election petition in the Punjab and Haryana High Court challenging the election of the first respondent on several grounds of which only three have been pressed in this appeal. All the grounds urged before us relate to corrupt practices as defined in subsections (2), (3), (4), and (7) (d) of Section 123 of the Representation of the People Act, 1951.

(2.) Sec. 123 (2) provides that undue influence meaning any direct or indirect interference or attempt to interfere on the part of the candidate or his agent, or of any other person with the consent of the candidate or his election agent, with the free exercise of any electoral right shall be deemed to be corrupt practice for the purposes of the Act. This clause has a proviso which says inter alia that any person who threatens any candidate or an elector or any person in whom a candidate or an elector is interested, with injury of any kind shall be deemed to interfere with the free exercise of the electoral right of such candidate or elector within the meaning of this clause. The allegations under this head are set out in paragraph 12 (i) of the election petition which reads as follows:

(3.) P. W. 14 Roop Chand who was the petitioner's polling agent at Jaraula Polling Station also claimed to have seen Lila Ram being beaten with lathis and statd that he complained to the Presiding Officer verbally. Of the two other eye-witnesses to the incident, P. W. 8 Dalip Singh's version is that he sent Lila Ram and Dhanpat to Pataudi hospital in a jeep and then ran away from the place along with others out of fear, thinking that no further polling would be possible; P. W. 11 Hukam Chand went to Farukh Nagar Police Station at 3 P. M. and handed over to the Head Constable a written application narrating the incident. According to him he had to wait for about an hour or an hour and a half before his report was recorded in the daily diary. He then visited the injured at the Civil Hospital, Gurgaon about 8.30 P. M. Hukam Chand told Dhanpat that he had lodged a report about the incident at Farukh Nagar Police Station. P. W. 9 Jagbir Singh. Head Constable of Police Station Farukh Nagar, admitted that Hukam Chand had submitted a written application which was copied out and entered by him in the daily diary report (Roznamcha).