- (1.) This is an appeal under Section 116-A of the Representation of the People Act, 1951 (hereinafter RPA, for short) preferred by a candidate successful at the election but against whom an election petition filed by a candidate who had lost at the election has been allowed by the High Court on the ground of commission of corrupt practices as defined in sub-sections (3A) and (4) of Section 123 of the RPA. For the sake of convenience the parties will be referred to as they are arrayed before this Court in this appeal, that is to say, Vilasrao Dagdojirao Deshmukh who had filed the election petition and is arrayed as respondent in this appeal shall be referred to as the respondent and Shivajirao Balwantrao Patil Kawekar who was arrayed as defendant/respondent before the High Court and is appellant before us shall be referred to as the appellant.
(2.) Elections to the Maharashtra State Legislative Assembly from 206 Latur Assembly Constituency took place on 9-2-1995. The respondent was a candidate sponsored by Congress (I). The appellant was sponsored by Janta Dal. Result of the election was declared on 12-3-1995. The respondent got 79077 votes while the appellant secured 1,12,901 votes. The appellant was thus declared elected.
(3.) The election petition alleged commission of several corrupt practices. As many as 28 issues were framed by the learned designated Election Judge based on the pleadings of the parties. As the judgment under appeal shows the learned designated Election Judge has found issues numbers 6 to 10 and 11 to 15 proved. On the rest of the issues the findings recorded are in the negative. The subject-matter of this appeal are the affirmative findings recorded on issues numbers 6 to 15. The finding on issue No. 3 is also subject-matter of challenge laid by the appellant before us. These issues are extracted and reproduced hereunder :- (3) Is it proved by the respondent that the petition is liable for dismissal for non-compliance of Rule 94-A read with Rule 25 of the Conduct of Election Rules xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx (6) Does petitioner prove that Prof. Mohan Kamble has published in a daily 'Jan Jagran' dated 25-1-1995 the statement that petitioner is having MAMULI opposition and petitioner be opposed by MAMULI (7) Does petitioner prove that Prof. Mohan Kamble published said statement in 'Jan Jagran' dated 25-1-1995 with the consent of the respondent (8) Does petitioner prove that Prof. Mohan Kamble and respondent published said statement in 'Jan Jagran' dated 25-1-1995 for promotion or attempting to promote feelings of hatred and enmity between different communities of Latur Constituency on the ground of religion, caste and community for prejudicially affecting the election of petitioner and thereby committed corrupt practice under Section 123 (3A) of the Act (9) Does petitioner prove that the respondent made a statement on 20-2-1995 in a meeting held at Town Hall, Latur that the respondent's victory at election is as a result of the magic played by the words "Mamuli" and thereby accepted the commission of corrupt practice under Section 123(3A) of the Representation of the People Act (10) Does petitioner prove that Prof. M. B. Pathan Editor of weekly 'Lawa Lawi' published article on 5-2-1995 under heading "Vilasrao's father Dagdoji Deshmukh and his relatives inhumanly attacked on Muslims", as stated in para Nos. 12 and 13 and Exhibit 'C' of the petition (11) Does petitioner prove that Prof. M. B. Pathan published said article with the consent of the respondent (12) Does petitioner prove that Prof. M. B. Pathan and the respondent published the statements of facts in the said article which is false and which the respondent and Prof. M. B. Pathan believed to be false or do not believe to be true (13) Does petitioner prove that the statement of facts published in the said article are in relation to the personal character and conduct of the petitioner and was reasonably calculated to prejudice the prospects of the petitioner's election and thereby committed corrupt practice under Section 123(4) of the Act (14) Does petitioner prove that as a result of said article dated 5-2-1995 in weekly "Lava Lavi", communal tension was created in constituency and Muslim voters had gathered in groups and thereby ultimately complaint under Section 125 of the Representation of the People Act and Section 153-A of the Indian Penal Code bearing No. 9/1993 was filed with the Gandhi Chowk Police Station, Latur (15) Does petitioner prove that Prof. M. B. Pathan and respondent published said article for promotion or attempting to promote feeling of enmity and hatred against petitioner amongst the Muslim voters of Latur constituency on the ground of religion and community for prejudicially affecting the election of petitioner and thereby committed corrupt practice under Section 123(3A) of the Representation of the People Act ;