EC recants order on action against IAS officer, informs Guj HC

The Election Commission (EC) on Tuesday told the Gujarat High Court it has taken back its recommendation to the Rajasthan government seeking action against an IAS officer regarding a petition challenging the poll victory of BJP minister Bhupendrasinh Chudasama.

The EC told Justice Paresh Upadhyay that after due consideration, it has decided to modify its earlier recommendation to the Rajasthan government, and sought that "disciplinary action against the officer, Vinita Bohra, may not be initiated at this stage".

Bohra was a poll observer for the Dholka Assembly constituency during the December 2017 Gujarat elections when Chudasama was elected. She is currently posted in Rajasthan.

The EC had earlier told the court that on April 30 it had recommended disciplinary proceedings against Bohra as well as then returning officer Dhaval Jani, a Gujarat government officer, after the court made scathing observations against them.

Chudasama, Gujarat's Cabinet Minister for Higher and Technical Education, Law and Justice and Civil Aviation, had won the election from Dholka by a narrow margin of 327 votes.

His election has been challenged by Congress candidate Ashwin Rathod, who claimed the BJP leader engaged in "corrupt practices and breached many of the mandatory instructions of the Election Commission of India".

The high court on Tuesday asked the EC what was its stand on Jani, the returning officer, who had admitted in the court that he did not follow certain EC instructions while counting the votes, which led to Chudasama's victory by a thin margin.

The EC told the court it will inform about its stand during the next hearing on August 7.

The HC had earlier observed that Jani's examination brought out facts "so glaring that this court thought it is prudent to put the above noted facts to the notice of the EC so that it can consider and take appropriate corrective/ preventive measures if it so desires.

As the victory margin was less than the number of postal ballots rejected by the returning officer (429), he (Jani) should have carried out re-verification of all postal ballots as per EC rules, the court had said.