An election petition that alleges corrupt practices without giving the time, place, persons and amounts cannot go to trial, the Bombay High Court has held, rejecting Vinayak Bhaurao Raut’s challenge to Narayan Rane’s 2024 Lok Sabha win from Ratnagiri-Sindhudurg at the threshold.
Kolhapur: The Bombay High Court, Circuit Bench at Kolhapur, has rejected an election petition challenging the 2024 Lok Sabha election of Narayan Tatu Rane from the 46 Ratnagiri-Sindhudurg constituency, holding that the allegations of corrupt practice did not contain the material facts and particulars required by Section 83(1) of the Representation of the People Act, 1951 [Vinayak Bhaurao Raut v. Election Commission of India and Others].
Justice Shailesh P. Brahme allowed the application of the returned candidate, Rane, under Order VII Rule 11 of the Code of Civil Procedure, which he had filed as respondent no. 5, and held that Election Petition No. 7 of 2024 stands rejected, with no order as to costs. The order was reserved on August 31, 2026 and pronounced on September 29, 2026.
Background of the case
Campaigning for the constituency ended on May 5, 2024, polling took place on May 7 and the results were declared on June 4. Rane secured 4,48,514 votes and Raut 4,00,656. Raut filed the election petition on July 9, 2024, alleging grounds under Section 100(1) of the Act. The application turned on paragraphs 5(l) to 5(n) of the petition, which alleged that BJP workers were campaigning on May 6, 2024 after the campaign period ended, that Raut had complained on May 16, 2024 that Rane’s campaign workers were distributing money to voters and had submitted a video on a pen drive to the Election Commission, and that on May 6 a BJP worker, Mr. Jadhav, was bribing voters and showing them the EVM and the lotus symbol. These are the petitioner’s allegations and were not tried.
Submissions
Senior Advocate Satish Maneshinde, for Rane, argued that the petition lacked material facts and particulars of the alleged corrupt practices as Section 83(1)(a) and (b) require, disclosed no cause of action, and suffered from a supporting affidavit not in Form 25 under Rule 94A of the Conduct of Election Rules, 1961, a verification not in line with Order VI Rule 15 CPC, and incomplete translations of annexures. He relied on Kanimozhi Karunanidhi v. A. Santhana Kumar, Karim Uddin Barbhuiya v. Aminul Haque Laskar and Bombay High Court decisions including Amol Gajanan Kirtikar v. Ravindra Dattaram Waikar.
Advocate Asim Sarode, for Raut, argued that the petition had to be read with the exhibits, news items, video clips, supporting affidavits and the May 16 complaint, that sufficient particulars were given, that a full trial was needed, that the affidavit, verification and translation defects were curable, and that a microscopic inquiry is not permissible at this stage. He relied on Bhim Rao Baswanth Rao Patil v. K. Madan Mohan Rao, G.M. Siddeshwar v. Prasanna Kumar and Ponnala Lakshmaiah v. Kommuri Pratap Reddy.
The Court’s reasoning
The Court held that Order VII Rule 11 can be invoked to reject an election petition, since the Code applies through Section 87 of the Act, and that a petition without full particulars of a corrupt practice, including names, date and place, is liable to be rejected. It found paragraph 5(l), on campaigning on May 6, very vague, lacking time, place and the identity of those campaigning, and the news reports insufficient to corroborate it. Paragraph 5(m), based on the May 16 complaint, did not identify the person, the amount, the time or the place, and paragraph 5(n) also lacked material particulars, since Jadhav is a very common surname. The pen drives were produced with a certificate under the Evidence Act, but the petitioner had not transcribed their contents, so the documents could not fill the gaps. It described the pleadings as absurd and the vital pleadings as very vague, and, applying the Supreme Court’s decisions, held that:
“…omission of a single material fact would lead to an incomplete cause of action…”
Curable defects
On the other objections the Court sided with the petitioner. Relying on the three-Judge Bench decision in G.M. Siddeshwar, it held that an affidavit not in Form 25, or a defective verification, is curable where there is substantial compliance, so those objections were not substantial defects. It distinguished Bhim Rao Baswanth Rao Patil, which concerned non-disclosure of criminal antecedents, and held that defective translation of annexures cannot by itself be a ground for rejection and cannot be examined under Order VII Rule 11. The other objections, including want of verification of the synopsis, statement of facts and list of documents, were not pressed and were curable.
Result
The Court noted that the petition contained other allegations, but held that the non-compliance with Section 83, being an omission of material facts, left no cause of action and entitled the returned candidate to rejection at the threshold. It allowed the application, rejected Election Petition No. 7 of 2024, and made no order as to costs.
Case Title: Vinayak Bhaurao Raut v. Election Commission of India and Others (application by Narayan Tatu Rane)
Case Number: Application in Election Petition (St.) No. 36815 of 2024 in Election Petition No. 7 of 2024
Bench: Justice Shailesh P. Brahme, Bombay High Court, Circuit Bench at Kolhapur
Date of Order: September 29, 2026 (reserved on August 31, 2026)
Appearance: Senior Advocate Satish Maneshinde with Advocates Saket Mone, Srushti Thorat and Yuvraj Dhole for the applicant-returned candidate; Advocate Asim Sarode with Advocates Shriya Aawale, Saken Mujawar, Tushar Sonule and Prabuddha Borgaonkar for the election petitioner