On Monday, the Himachal High Court heard the petition challenging the election of Kangana Ranaut, who became BJP MP from Mandi. Kangana responded to the court’s notice today through the advocate. Actually, in the last hearing, the court had issued a notice to Kangana. Now this matter will be heard after four weeks. In the next hearing, the advocate of petitioner Layak Ram will have to respond.
Let us tell you that Layak Ram Negi, a resident of Kinnaur district, has filed a petition in the High Court to cancel the election of the Mandi parliamentary seat. The High Court had issued notice to Kangana on Negi’s petition. Layak Ram had also filed nomination papers from Mandi Lok Sabha’s seat.
According to Layak Ram Negi, his nomination papers were rejected wrongly. Therefore, he has demanded the cancellation of the Mandi Lok Sabha elections. Layak Ram has also made the Returning Officer (RO) and DC Mandi respondents in this case. He has demanded re-election on the Mandi seat.
The petitioner said, “Objections were raised against me during the nomination. According to Layak Ram, he filed his nomination papers from Mandi Lok Sabha seat on 14 May. On his premature retirement from the Forest Department, he submitted the necessary no-dues certificate issued by the Forest Department along with the nomination form to the Election Officer.”
During the nomination, he was told that he would also have to submit no-dues certificates for electricity, water and telephone issued by the concerned departments independently for the government residence. He was given time till the next day to submit this certificate. Layak Ram’s nomination was cancelled for this reason. The nomination papers were to be scrutinised on 15 May.
According to the applicant, on 15 May, he submitted the no-dues certificates for electricity, water, and telephone issued by various departments to the RO. But he refused to accept this document and said that not attaching the above no-dues certificate in the applicant’s nomination is a big mistake, which cannot be rectified now. After this, his nomination was rejected.