Issue of penalising political parties, candidates needs to be dealt with carefully, says SC

The Supreme Court Friday said the issue of penalising political parties or candidates for not disclosing criminal antecedents has to be dealt with carefully as allegations of sedition and anti-national are often made with "political overtones".

The apex court was dealing with a contempt plea which has raised the issue of criminalisation of politics claiming that directions given by the top court in its September 25, 2018 verdict, relating to disclosure of criminal antecedents by candidates, were not being followed.

"Now, charges with political overtones are brought in. It is easy to frame charges on this....it is very easy to frame charges in cases which may be filed by political opponent including of sedition and anti-national. We have to be very careful," a bench of Justices R F Nariman and S Ravindra Bhat said.

The Election Commission told the court that increase in number of MPs having pending criminal cases was "disturbing" and as per the statistics, there were 43 per cent MPs in the current Parliament who have criminal cases against them.

"The number (of MPs having pending criminal cases) has gone up and that is the disturbing part," said senior lawyer Vikas Singh, appearing for the poll panel.

Singh said the EC has agreed with the suggestions of senior lawyer Gopal Sankaranarayanan, representing BJP leader and petitioner Ashiwini Upadhyay, including that all political parties should mandatorily upload on their website details of candidates with criminal antecedents along with the reasons as to why those without any criminal record could not be selected.

However, the EC said it was not agreeable to the suggestion regarding penalising the political party or its candidates under Article 324 of the Constitution for their failure to disclose criminal antecedents, as it does not have this power.

Sankaranarayanan told the bench that the Constitution bench judgement of September 2018 should be complied with and without penalty or sanction, the political parties or their candidates would not act accordingly as mandated by the top court.

"Let the political process take care of itself. Let us be practical," he said.

He then referred to section 33-A of the Representation of the People Act, 1951 which stipulates that a candidate has to furnish details, including as to whether he is accused of any offence punishable with jail term of two years or more in a pending case in which charges has been framed, in his nomination paper.

The bench, which had earlier asked the EC and petitioner to sit together and come up with suggestions, said it would pass order in the matter.

At the fag end of hearing, Singh, while referring to rise in number of lawmakers having pending criminal case, said: "There is no debate today on this. Nobody is bothered."