Bombay HC issues summons to Narayan Rane on Sena (UBT) leader's plea seeking cancellation of his election

The Bombay High Court on Friday issued a summons to BJP MP Narayan Rane on Shiv Sena (UBT) leader Vinayak Raut's plea seeking cancellation of the former's election from the Ratnagiri-Sindhudurg constituency.

Rane defeated Raut, a two-term MP, by a margin of 47,858 votes in his debut election for Lok Sabha. He polled 4,48,514 votes, while Raut secured 4,00,656 votes.

Raut had last month filed an election petition in the high court, claiming that Rane had won the polls by "fraudulent means", and demanded the cancellation of the BJP leader's election from the Ratnagiri-Sindhudurg seat and that he be banned from contesting elections and voting for five years.

A single bench of Justice S V Kotwal issued a summons (notice) to Rane and sought his response to the plea.

The court has posted the matter for further hearing on September 12.

Raut, in his petition, also sought directions to the Election Commission of India (ECI) for fresh or re-election in the constituency.

Pending the hearing, the Shiv Sena (UBT) leader has sought direction to restrain Rane from continuing as the Ratnagiri-Sindhudurg MP.

He alleged that after the poll campaign ended, a video surfaced in which Rane's supporters were seen distributing money to voters by showing them an EVM and asking them to vote for the BJP leader through "illegal and unfair" means.

Raut sought direction from the court to constitute an independent committee to investigate the videos.

He cited that as per the Representation of People Act, 1951, the campaign activities are to be halted 48 hours before elections. However, the acts of Rane and his campaigners were in "clear violation of statutory provision".

In May, Raut filed a complaint before the chief electoral officer of Maharashtra. However, when there was no response, Raut moved the high court.