Keyword – KSU, INC, KHC
On Monday, the Kerala High Court ordered the Sree Kerala Varma College, Thrissur, college union’s returning officer to provide the records pertaining to the election held for the position of college chairman.
By sending notice to the respondents, Justice T.R. Ravi also requested a response from the Principal, the Returning Officer, the Vice Chancellor, and the Opposite Party candidate who had been proclaimed the winner following the recount.
The Court additionally stated that any leadership of the College by the candidate of the Opposite Party, Anirudhan K.S., would be provisional and subject to further directions from the Court while the proceedings were pending.
The petitioner, Sreekuttan, a third-year B.A. Political Science student with extraordinary abilities, was first recognised as the CollegeUnion Chairman. The Kerala Students Union (KSU), the Indian National Congress’s student branch, put Sreekuttan forth as their candidate. According to the petitioner, he was initially pronounced the winner by a single vote, and KSU won the College for the first time in 41 years.
But in a stunning twist of circumstances, the Returning Officer had to recount the ballots that same day in response to pleas from the Opposite faction.
Following a recount, the candidate of the opposing group was proclaimed the Chairman with a margin of 10 votes.
Sreekuttan claimed that the College Principal had first opposed the recounting process and had even informed the media that the Cochin Devaswom Commissioner’s intervention was the reason the recounting had been restarted.
Thus, the petitioner claimed that unrelated causes had influenced the election results. He said that the votes that were deemed illegal during the counting process could not have been legitimated during the recounting process. As a result, he requested an investigation into the purported irregularities, tampering, and sabotage that occurred during the election process, as well as the handling of the re-election.
Judge Ravi today voiced his scepticism about the numbers in the pleadings pertaining to the overall number of votes cast and counted.
“After reading the papers you submitted, I’m not sure I believe what you’ve written because the overall number of votes cast for each statement varies. In one of the statements, you omitted the number; it is 1879, and so on. How did it take place? The total number of votes dropped to 1879 when the other gentleman received 10 votes once more. Why is it the case? I want to know everything about it. Without knowing all of this, I cannot immediately issue an interim order,” he stated.
In response to the petitioner’s argument that the case had a favourable balance of convenience because the Vice Chancellor could take over for a few days, the Court stated that further papers relevant to the case needed to be reviewed before making a decision.
As a result, the subject has been scheduled for additional review on Thursday.
Written by – Sohan Mishra , College name – SOA National Institute of Law , Semester – 3rd Semester an intern under legal Vidhiya
References
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