- (1.) Pratap Singh, the appellant before us under Sec. 116A of the Representation of the People Act, 1951 (hereinafter referred to as 'the Act'), was elected- at an election held on 11-3-1972 for the Haryana State Legislative Assembly, the result of which was declared on 12-3-1972. The Respondent Balbir Singh questioned this election by means of an election Petition alleging that the election was void as the appellant had committed corrupt practices hit by Sec. 123, sub-s. (4), (5) and (6) of the Act. The petition was allowed by a . learned Judge of the High Court of Punjab and Haryana. solely on the ground that the corrupt practice, provided far as follows, in Section 123 (5) of- the Act. was committed by the appellant: "123 (5) The hiring or procuring, whether on payment or otherwise, of any vehicle or vessel by a candidate or his agent or by any other person with the consent of a candidate or his election agent, or the use of such vehicle or vessel for the free conveyance of any elector (other than the candidate himself, the members of his family or his agent) to or from any polling station provided under Section 25 or a place fixed under subsection (1) of Section 29 for the poll: Provided that the hiring of a vehicle or vessel by an elector or by several electors at their joint costs for the purposes of conveying him or them to and from any such polling station or place fixed for the poll shall not be deemed to be a corrupt practice under this clause if the vehicle or vessel so hired is a vehicle or vessel not propelled by mechanical power. Provided further that the 'use of any public transport vehicle or vessel or any tramcar or railway carriage by any elector at his own cost for the purpose of going to or coming from any such polling station or place fixed for the poll shall not be deemed to be a corrupt practice under this clause".
(2.) The appellant assails the judgment of the High Court on the following main grounds with which, we will deal seriatim: 1. That, the High Court erred in relying upon legally unproved entries in what is called a Pukar book or register showing both the hiring out and then payments for the use of certain trucks on 11-3-1972, the date of election for purposes of election. 2. That, the Register itself is in admissible in evidence under any provision of the Evidence Act. 3. That, the entries in the Pukar Register are suspicious indicating that the Register itself, or, at least, the entries involved were not contemporaneous but fabricated after the election was over. 4. That, the High Court erred in relying upon the evidence of challans by the police on 11-3-1972 of drivers of trucks said to have been used by the appellant when the best evidence in the possession of the police relating to these challans was not forthcoming so that the challans .appeared d to have been manoeuvred for the purpose of supporting a false case. 5. That, the High Court erred in relying upon merely uncorroborated oral testimony of Motor truck drivers in accepting the respondent's case which was not really corroborated as the alleged corroborative evidence was not evidence at all in the eye of law. 6. That the High Court overlooked the well established principle that the charge of a corrupt practice in the course of an election must be treated as quasi-criminal in character which has to be proved beyond reasonable doubt.
(3.) We will deal with these objections in the reverse order, starting with the last mentioned ground of attack on the High Court's judgment. The judgment rests largely on appreciation of oral evidence. It could not, therefore, be easily disturbed by us as has been repeatedly pointed out by this Court even in first appeals on facts in election cases. If the High Court overlooks serious infirmities in the evidence adduced to support the case accepted by it or misreads evidence or ignores the principle that a charge of corrupt practice, in the course of an election, is a grave one which, if established, caste a serious reflection and imposes a disability upon the candidate held guilty of it, so that the Court must be satisfied beyond reasonable daubs about its veracity, this Court will not hesitate to interfere.;