Madhya Pradesh minister Narottam Mishra, who was disqualified by the Election Commission of India (ECI) on charges of paid news, today argued before the Delhi High Court that there was no evidence against him.
Commencing arguments before a bench of S Ravindra Bhat and Sunil Gaur, Mishra's counsel submitted that ECI had relied on the report of a paid news committee which could only be taken as a suggestion and not binding because he had not been issued a notice or was summoned.
"It was done behind my back. It's failure of justice. The error was relying on the committee's report which was not binding. On face of the record, there was no evidence which showed he had authorised paid news articles," senior advocate C A Sundaram, who appeared for Mishra, argued.
He claimed there was no finding that Mishra had paid for the news.
The bench was hearing an appeal by the BJP leader challening the July 14 order of a single judge of the high court which had upheld ECI's decision disqualifying Mishra.
The court listed the matter for September 13 to hear further arguments of Mishra's counsel.
During the hearing, the advocate said the single judge's order was also based on the committee's report.
He took the ground of "inordinate delay" in the matter and said a show cause notice was issued to him by the ECI on January 15, 2013 for an occurance which took place in 2008 when the assembly elections were held in Madhya Pradesh.
The matter had reached the Delhi High Court after the Supreme Court on July 12 transferred the case to it to be decided expeditiously before the July 17 presidential polls.
Mishra had sought an interim stay on the single judge's order upholding the ECI order as a last ditch attempt to vote in the July 17 presidential election. He could not cast his ballot in the election.
Pursuant to the apex court's decision, the high court had the same day constituted a special single-judge bench.
The ECI's order had held him guilty of filing wrong accounts of election expense relating to articles and advertorials in the media during the 2008 assembly polls.
The ECI order had come on a complaint by Congress leader Rajendra Bharti, who had contested the polls against Mishra in the 2008 assembly elections.
Mishra had contested the ECI decision on the grounds of delay in proceedings and that no evidence showed he had authorised paid news articles.
While disqualifying Mishra from contesting elections for three years, the poll panel had used some strong words against paid news, calling it a "cancerous menace" that is assuming "alarming proportions" in the electoral landscape. His election from Datia assembly constituency also stood void.
Mishra was the minister for water resources and public relations and the chief spokesperson of the Shivraj Singh Chouhan government.
Bharti, the main complainant in the case, had first sent complaint to the ECI about eight years back in 2009. The poll panel order had said that all the 42 news items that had appeared in five Hindi dailies were "extremely biased in favour of" Mishra.
It had said that its findings had also strengthened the conclusion that he had "knowingly participated or took advantage of the expenditure on such advertisements" that had appeared as news in the publication.
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