Hasirani Rath
In its writ petition, Congress asked if the age declared by Rath is above 60 years, how could she pass Class 10 examination from Chowkhal Ganga Pada Milan Kanya Vidyapith (HS) in 1965. Maintaining that the Madhyamik system had not been introduced in Bengal in 1965, the party contented that either the declaration of age or the year of qualification was incorrect.
The judge held: “Article 329 (b) of the Constitution provides that no election to either House of Parliament or to the House or either House of the Legislature of a State shall be called in question except by an election petition presented to such authority and in such manner as may be provided for by or under any law made by the appropriate legislature. BJP said there was no discrepancy in Rath’s age, claiming she studied in Class 10 in 1980 and the 1965 reference was a typographical error. It released a school-issued certificate showing her date of birth as June 8, 1965. Senior advocate Dama Seshadri Naidu, representing the Election Commission, submitted that scrutiny of nomination was fixed on Sept 17 and the last date of withdrawal was Sept 19. He said it was only on Sept 21 that a complaint was submitted but, by then, Rath’s candidature had been accepted.
Kolkata: Calcutta High Court on Tuesday dismissed the petition of West Bengal Pradesh Congress Committee pointing a finger at the “action of returning officer” for accepting the nomination of Hasirani Rath as BJP’s Nandigram bypoll candidate despite an alleged discrepancy in her age and year of passing Class 10, observing that any interference now would “directly affect the election process”. Justice Krishna Rao, however, kept the option of an election petition open to Congress if the party wanted to dispute Rath’s participation in future. The writ petition filed against our Nandigram candidate by a signboard party (Congress) and Trinamool Congress has been dismissed. Justice Rao observed that Congress had not filed any objection on the date of scrutiny of the nomination papers.
Reacting to the development, CM Suvendu Adhikari said: “We have received very good news from the high court.