Dead candidate’s name can stay on EVM: SC
Defining the election rules on symbols and the difference between allocation of the same to the candidates nominated by political parties and Independents, the Supreme Court has held that once a symbol is inscribed in electronic voting machines its removal was not necessary in case of the death of a candidate before the polling.
The apex court further said that any vote polled by pressing the button of the symbol allotted to the dead candidate would not render the election process in a constituency as null and void as such a situation will arise only if the dead person is an Independent.
Otherwise, the case of the death of a nominee of a political party, the polling will in any way be “adjourned” to some other date. A bench of Justices R.M. Lodhia and H.L. Gokhale gave the ruling while defining the 1996 amended made in the Representation of People Act, 1951.
The issue of the death of a candidate has been dealt in Section 52 of the amended RPA.
“The substituted Section 52 of the 1996 Act now takes cognisance of the death of a candidate of recognised political party before the poll in three situations. The significant change brought in the law by the 1996 amendment is that the death of a candidate of a recognised political party before the poll results in the adjournment of the poll to a date to be notified later and not countermand of the election,” the SC said.
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