KANDIMALLA RAMACHANDRAM Vs. DULIPALLA SESHAYYA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The petitioner seeks to quash the Order of the Election Commissioner, Guntur, setting aside his election and declaring the first respondent as duly elected to the Panchayat of Turlapadu, Guntur district.

(2.) The facts leading up to this petition lie within narrow bounds. In the panchayat elections of Turlapadu village held on 7th October, 1959, the petitioner and the first respondent were the contesting candidates for the membership of the panchayat from the second ward. In the election, the petitioner polled 106 votes as against 105 secured by the first respondent and the petitioner was declared as duly elected.

(3.) Thereupon, the first respondent presented an Election Petition questioning the validity of the election inter alia on the grounds that two of the voters who recorded their votes in favour of the petitioner were minors and that voter No. 459 who cast his vote in his favour was a fictitious person. The petitioner contested the petition, denying the various allegations and pleading that no one who voted for him was a minor and that voter No. 459 was not a nonexistent person but was entered as a voter in the Electoral Roll as a resident in the petitioner's house.