The Supreme Court on Monday refused to grant any relief to the YSR Congress Party on its plea against new rules for counting of postal ballots in Andhra Pradesh.
The Bench comprising Justice Arvind Kumar and Justice Sandeep Mehta stated that there was no need to interfere with the Andhra Pradesh High Court’s decision to decline relief to the political party since an election petition could be filed in the matter. The top court ruled that in the facts and circumstances of the case, the bench refused to interfere.
The YSR Congress Party approached the top court challenging the validity of relaxed norms to recognise the counting of postal ballots in Andhra Pradesh.
The party asserted that the Election Commission of India (ECI) relaxed the norms in Andhra Pradesh. Particularly, the mandatory requirement of name and designation of the attesting officer to be mentioned in Form 13A as per the Rules was dispensed with. After the relaxation, only the specimen signatures of all such officers are required. The political party further claimed that the same was done for the sole purpose of validating postal ballots that do not adhere to the mandatory requirement of law.
Notably, the party had first approached the Andhra Pradesh High Court with its grievance. Nonetheless, the High Court on June 1 declined to grant any relief to the party and asked it to file an election petition instead of pursuing a remedy under writ jurisdiction. The High Court stated that the writ plea is disposed of with liberty to the petitioner to pursue remedies in a properly framed election petition.
Consecutively, the party filed an appeal before the Supreme Court against the High Court’s decision. Nonetheless, after the matter was mentioned on Monday, the apex court clarified that it would not interfere. Senior Advocate Abhishek Manu Singhvi appeared for the YSR Congress.