Madhya Pradesh High Court today declared Congress candidate Balmukund Singh Gautam as winner from Dhar Assembly constituency, almost five years after he was declared lost by one vote to his BJP rival Neena Verma.
Gautam had challenged his defeat claiming that the concerned officials purposefully miscalculated the seven postal ballots just ahead of the election results on the direction of the ruling BJP government to declare Verma elected.
The petitioner had contended that even though these postal ballots were earlier rejected by poll officials they were recounted again.
While Gautam had polled 50,509 votes, Neena Verma, wife of senior BJP leader Vikram Verma, secured 50,510 votes.
High Court Judge Moolchand Garg accepted Gautam's contention against the election result and declared him winner from Dhar seat.
"The high court has elected Gautam as winner from Dhar assembly seat after hearing arguments from both the parties," Gautam's lawyer Abhinav Dhanodkar told reporters.
However, he did not specify the exact margin of votes by which the court has declared Gautam as elected, saying he has not received the written order yet.
Dhanodkar said though the high court had declared Verma's election as null and void on October 19, 2012 itself, it did not declare Gautam elected following the pendency of recrimination petition filed by Verma before the high court, which was dismissed today.
However, the high court's decision will come into effect only after 14 days as per the Supreme Court order on a petition filed by Verma.
Interestingly, even after a long legal battle, Gautam would be able to represent the seat only for nearly three months as Assembly elections are due in Madhya Pradesh in November.
Gautam had alleged that the then Collector Rajkumar Pathak and Sub-Divisional Magistrate K C Gutpa purposefully miscalculated votes under pressure from BJP government.
