First Division Bench of Chief Justice Manindra Mohan Shrivastava and Justice G. Arul Murugan said no such direction could be issued by the court on the judicial side.
The Madras High Court on Thursday rejected a public interest litigation petition which insisted upon disposal of election petitions, challenging the victory of Members of Parliament and Members of the Legislative Assembly, within six months from the date of filing.
First Division Bench of Chief Justice Manindra Mohan Shrivastava and Justice G. Arul Murugan said, no such direction as the one sought by the PIL petitioner, Tirunelveli-based advocate K. Venkatachalapathy, could be issued by the court on the judicial side.
When senior counsel Ravi Prakash argued the matter on behalf of the petitioner, the Chief Justice wondered how his Bench could issue a direction to the other judges of the High Court. “What direction do you want us to give and to whom such direction should be issued to?” he asked the counsel.
In an affidavit, filed through his counsel on record V.R. Shanmuganathan, the petitioner said, the Representation of the People Act of 1951 empowers only the High Court of a State to try election petitions and requires the Chief Justice to assign those petitions to any of the single judges of the court.
Further, Section 86(7) of the Act states that every election petition should be tried as expeditiously as possible and every endeavour should be made to conclude the trial within six months from the date on which the election petition was presented to the High Court for trial.
Nevertheless, the trial in most of the election petitions conclude only at the fag end of the tenure of the legislator concerned and some of them do not get decided even after the expiry of the tenure, the petitioner lamented. He said, even the Supreme Court had taken cognisance of such delay.
Passing orders in Mohammed Akbar versus Ashok Sahu in 2015, the top court had said: “Membership of the legislative bodies is a sacred responsibility. The continuance of any member in such bodies who secured his election to such a body by legally impermissible means, even for a day, is most undesirable.”
The Supreme Court also wrote: “We are sad to state that invariably the resolution of election disputes in this country takes unacceptably long periods in most of the cases. Very rarely, an election dispute gets resolved during the tenure of the declared candidate reducing the adjudicatory process into a mockery of justice.”
Observing it was desirable to have dedicated benches in every High Court for the hearing of election petitions alone, the top court had said, the judges dealing with election petitions may not be burdened with any other work until the disposal of those petitions.
Despite the ruling, the delay continues and the election petitions do not get decided within six months, the petitioner complained. He sought a direction to the Centre, Election Commission of India and the Registrar General of the Madras High Court to ensure strict compliance of the mandate under Section 86(7).
On the other hand, the High Court’s standing counsel B. Vijay, representing the Registrar General, informed the first Bench that the Supreme Court had on August 12, 2024 dismissed a case filed before it, by another individual, with an identical prayer and therefore, the present case too need not be entertained.
Published – October 23, 2025 07:53 pm IST
