Saying a “dua,” or prayer, for success in an election is essentially a believer’s communication with God and does not amount to exercising undue influence or soliciting votes in the name of religion, the Supreme Court held, upholding a Bombay High Court verdict that had affirmed an AIMIM MLA’s election from Malegaon Central.
New Delhi: The Supreme Court has upheld a Bombay High Court judgment holding that the act of saying a “dua” (prayer) for success in an election neither amounts to the exercise of undue influence nor to soliciting votes in the name of religion, and has affirmed the election of AIMIM MLA Mufti Mohammad Ismail Abdul Khalique from the Malegaon Central Assembly constituency in the 2024 Maharashtra elections [Shaan-e-Hind v. Mufti Mohammad Ismail Abdul Khalique].
A Bench of Justice Vikram Nath, Justice Augustine George Masih and Justice Sandeep Mehta dismissed the appeal filed against the High Court’s June 8 judgment, which had rejected an election petition challenging Khalique’s win.
The dispute
The case arose from the November 2024 Maharashtra Assembly election in Malegaon Central, a closely-fought contest. Khalique, the AIMIM candidate, secured 1,09,563 votes, while the runner-up, Shaikh Asif Shaikh Rashid, secured 1,09,491 votes, a margin of just 72 votes. Shaan-e-Hind Nihal Ahmed, contesting on a Samajwadi Party ticket, secured 9,624 votes.
The runner-up challenged Khalique’s election before the Bombay High Court, alleging corrupt practices during the campaign. The High Court rejected the election petition, and the Samajwadi Party candidate, Ahmed, then carried the matter to the Supreme Court.
The allegations of a religious appeal
A significant part of the challenge concerned the alleged use of religious references during the campaign, said to fall foul of the bar on appeals to religion in Section 123(3) of the Representation of the People Act, 1951, which makes an appeal to vote (or to refrain from voting) on the ground of a candidate’s religion a corrupt practice. The election petition alleged, among other things, that the returned candidate had invoked Islam and religious texts while campaigning, and cited instances of “dua” being offered at various campaign locations, along with speeches and pamphlets said to project the candidate as representing Muslims. These were the appellant’s allegations, which the courts below did not accept as establishing any corrupt practice.
The election petition also alleged that a number of deceased persons had remained on the electoral rolls and were shown as having voted, a point the challenger said was significant given the narrow margin. The High Court, however, rejected the election petition at the threshold.
‘A dua is a communication with God, not a pledge’
On the central question, the High Court had held that the act of saying a dua, and the response of “Amen,” does not amount to a pledge, and that a prayer for success in an election does not constitute either undue influence or the soliciting of votes in the name of religion. The Supreme Court upheld that reasoning. In the passage affirmed by the Supreme Court, the High Court had observed:
“The act of saying Dua (prayer) and the response thereto by ‘Amen’ does not amount to pledge. As the Dua is essentially a form of the communication by the believer with the God, saying prayer for success in the election neither amounts to exercise of undue influence nor soliciting votes in the name of the religion.”
Before the Supreme Court, the appellant argued that the High Court had erred in examining individual speeches in isolation, and ought instead to have assessed the campaign material as a whole. The top court was not persuaded and dismissed the appeal, leaving the High Court’s findings, and Khalique’s election, undisturbed. The appellant was represented by Senior Advocate Mukul Rohatgi; the returned candidate by Senior Advocate Shadan Farasat.
Why the judgment matters
The judgment touches one of the more delicate areas of election law: the line between the constitutionally protected exercise of religion and an impermissible appeal to religion that vitiates an election under Section 123(3) of the Representation of the People Act. That provision, and the Supreme Court’s jurisprudence on it, including the seven-judge Bench decision in Abhiram Singh v. C.D. Commachen, which read the “his religion” in the section broadly to cover appeals on the religion of the candidate, the voter, the election agent or anyone else, seeks to keep elections free of religious appeals. The present case draws a distinction that matters in practice: an act of prayer or invocation of the divine, without more, is not the same as an appeal to the electorate to vote for a candidate on the ground of religion. Treating a dua as a communication with God rather than a solicitation of votes keeps the offence tethered to actual electoral appeals rather than to expressions of faith.
It bears emphasis that the various campaign-related allegations levelled in the election petition were exactly that, allegations, which the High Court declined to accept and which the Supreme Court, on appeal, found no reason to disturb; the courts have made no finding that any corrupt practice was committed. The dismissal also reflects the demanding standard that governs election petitions, which seek to unseat a candidate chosen by the electorate and must establish a corrupt practice with a high degree of proof. With the appeal dismissed, the Bombay High Court’s judgment stands, and the result in Malegaon Central, decided by 72 votes, is affirmed. The broader question of where religious expression ends and a prohibited religious appeal begins will continue to be worked out case by case under the framework of Section 123(3).
Case Title: Shaan-e-Hind (Nihal Ahmed) v. Mufti Mohammad Ismail Abdul Khalique
Bench: Justice Vikram Nath, Justice Augustine George Masih and Justice Sandeep Mehta, Supreme Court of India
Date of Order: September 24, 2026