H C THAMMAIAH Vs. STATE OF KARNATAKA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The material facts of the case are as follows: The petitioner who is a member of the Hunasewadi Mandal Panchayat, Mysore District, having been elected as a nominee of the Congress-I party at the election held on 20-1-1987, is aggrieved by the resolution adopted at a meeting of the Mysore Zilla Parishad of which respondent-2 is the Adhyaksha, authorising him to make nominations to all Mandal Panchayats in the District. According to the petitioner, it is only the Zilla Parishad which is empowered to make nominations under Section 5(3) of the Karnataka Zilla Parishads, Taluk Panchayats, Mandal Panchayats and Nyaya Panchayats Act, 1983 ('the Act' for short) and the nominations of respondents 7 and 8 are not valid in law since the said nominations were made by the Adhyaksha. The additional grievance of the petitioner is that these two nominees took part in the voting for the election of the Pradhan and Upa-Pradhan and in the election the votes cast by these two nominees tilted the election in favour of respondents 5 and 6. According to the petitioner, the election of respondents 5 and 6 as Pradhan and Upa-Pradhan is invalid and cannot be sustained in law.

(2.) On the other hand, according to the learned Counsel appearing for respondents 5 and 6, at the time when elections to the posts of Pradhan and Upa-Pradhan were being held, 12 persons who had the right to vote boycotted the election and walked out of the place of election without participation in the voting. As a result, 13 voters who were present at the time of the election took part in the vote and tendered their votes in favour of respondent 5 who was declared elected as the Pradhan. According to the learned Counsel, these voters who walked out of the election hall did not come back and on the same day after a brief interval of time election to the post of Upa-Pradhan was held. In this election, the same number of votes were registered in favour of respondent 6 with 12 voters having kept away from the election having boycotted the same and having left the venue of the election earlier when the Pradban was being elected.

(3.) The contention of the learned Counsel appearing for the petitioner is that though the 12 voters did not participate in the voting and staged a walk out at the time of the election of Pradhan, they were present when the election of the Upa-Pradhan took place, but they did not exercise their votes. In other words, the contention is that they remained neutral in the election though they were present at the time of voting with the result that the Upa-Pradhan was elected having secured 13 votes.