Technical hurdles have emerged in the Supreme Court ahead of the hearing on a petition filed by Congress MP Rahul Gandhi and several INDIA bloc leaders challenging alleged electoral irregularities and the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls.
The Supreme Court Registry has pointed out 14 deficiencies in the petition, including a shortfall of ₹220 in court fees. Apart from the fee discrepancy, the Registry flagged several procedural and documentation-related issues that must be rectified before the matter can proceed for hearing.
According to the objections raised, necessary approvals and supporting documents from nine petitioners were not attached. A photocopy of Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge’s identity card submitted with the petition was found to be illegible. The Registry also noted that several mandatory legal documents, including vakalatnamas, were either missing or incomplete.
The petition was further found to contain a number of technical and formatting errors. These included the use of an undersized font, failure to submit color copies of two important documents, faint printing on several pages that made them difficult to read, missing pages, and mistakes in page numbering. Certain statutory requirements relating to the format and documentation of the petition were also found to be incomplete.
The deficiencies came to light even as Congress and INDIA bloc leaders, accompanied by thousands of party workers, marched to the Supreme Court on Monday to protest against the Election Commission and Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar, alleging irregularities in the electoral process. At the same time, the alliance’s legal team was filing the joint petition before the apex court.
With the Registry having raised objections, the petitioners’ legal team will now have to remove the defects and complete the required formalities before the case can be taken up for hearing in accordance with Supreme Court procedures.
