The Delhi High Court has rejected the plea of an RTI activist challenging a trial court order rejecting his plea to lodge a graft case against AAP MLA Akhilesh Pati Tripathi for allegedly incurring expenses more than the prescribed limit in the 2013 assembly polls here.
The high court refused to interfere with the findings of the trial court that there was no infirmity with the election law on the spending for the 2013 Assembly elections, saying there was no substance in the petition.
"This court does not find any infirmity, illegality, impropriety or incorrectness in order dated April 29, 2016, passed by the Special Judge....This court does not find any substance in the present petition. There is no merit in it. The same is, accordingly, dismissed," Justice P S Teji said.
The high court order came on a plea by one Vivek Garg, who had challenged the trial court's April 29 order rejecting his complaint against Tripathi, a legislator from Model Town constituency in North Delhi, for allegedly spending over the prescribed limit of Rs 14 lakh in the 2013 election campaign.
Garg, also an advocate, in his complaint filed in 2015 had alleged that the AAP MLA, in collusion with unnamed officials of the Election Commission, had manipulated the account of expenditure on the campaign and understated it by about Rs nine lakh.
The complaint had also sought lodging an FIR against some officials of the Election Commission (ECI), Delhi Chief Electoral Office (CEO) and some officials of Delhi government, for allegedly colluding with Tripathi to manipulate account of expenditure incurred by him.
The high court, while dismissing his appeal, observed that "no specific allegation against any such officials was made in the complaint".
"If for the sake of argument, it is presumed that the officials did not scrutinise the final account of expenditure submitted by the candidate and did not take any action against him, the same does not fall within the meaning of criminal intent and there does not lie any criminal action against them.
"Since the allegations against the officials are alleged to have been committed during the discharge of their official duty, the submission of the petitioner that no sanction for lodging prosecution against such officials was required, holds no basis," Justice Teji noted in his 13-page judgement.
The petitioner had sought prosecution of the MLA for the alleged offences punishable under sections 420 (cheating), 409 (criminal breach of trust by a public servant) of the IPC and under various provisions of the Prevention of Corruption Act.
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