Summary
Section 77(1) of the Representation of the People Act, 1951, provides that every candidate at an election shall, either by himself or by his election agent, keep a separate and correct account of all expenditure, in connection with the election, incurred or authorised by him or by his election agent between the date of the publication of the notification calling the election and the date of declaration of result thereof, both dates inclusive; and s.
77(3) gays that the total of the said expenditure shall not exceed such amount as may be prescribed.The objects of enacting a ceiling on the expenditure which may legitimately be incurred in connection with an election are : (a)It should be open to any individual or to any political party, however small, to be able to contest an election on a footing of equality with any other individual or political party, however rich and well financed it may be, and no individual or political party should be able to secure an advantage over others by reason of its superior financial strength. The democratic process can function efficiently and effectively, for the benefit of the common good and reach out the benefits of self-government to the common man only if it brings about a participatory democracy in which every man, howsoever lowly or humble he may be, should be able to participate on a footing of equality with others.Now money. plays an important part in the successful prosecution of an election campaign by buying advertisement and canvassing facilities, by providing the means for quick and speedy communications and movements and sophisticated campaign techniques, and also by the employment of paid workers where volunteers are found to be insufficient.Therefore, if one political party or individual has larger resources available to it than another the former would certainly, under the present system of conducting elections, have an advantage over the latter in the electoral process.[265C-F](b)The other objective of limiting expenditure is to eliminate, as far as possible, the influence of big money in electoral process. If there were no limit on expenditure political parties would go all out for collecting contributions and obviously the largest contributions would be from the rich and the affluent who constitute but a fraction of the electorate. It is likely that some elected representatives would tend to share the views of the wealthy supporters of their political party, either because of shared background and association, increased access or subtle influenceswhich condition their thinking. In such an event, the result would be that thouostensibly the political parties which receive such contributions may profess an ideology acceptable to the common man, they would in effect and substance be the representatives of a certain economic class, and their policies and decisions would be shaped by the interests of that economic class.Persons of a particular class who have exclusive governmental power, even if they tried to act objectively, would tend to overlook the interests of other classes or view those interests differently. To this natural tendency may be added the fact that office bearers and elected representatives may quite possibly be inclined, though unconsciously and imperceptibly, to espouse the policies and decisions that will attract campaign contributions from affluent individuals and groups. Preelection donations would be Rely to operate as post-election promises resulting ultimately in the casualty of the interest of the common man. The small man's chance is the essence of Indian democracy and that would be stultified if large contributions from rich and affluent individuals or groups are not divorced from the electoral process.[266E-F, 267C-D, E-F, G-H]2-M255SupCII75 260Under s, 123(6) not only is the incurring of expenditure in excess of the prescribed limit a corrupt practice but also the authorising of such expenditure. Authorising may be implied or express, and whether a particular expenditure wag impliedly authorised by the candidate would depend upon the facts and circumstances of each case as appearing from the evidence adduced before the court. [264H-265B]The reasonable interpretation of the provision, which would carry out its object and intendment and suppress the mischief and advance the remedy by purifying the election process and ridding it of the pernicious and baneful influence of big money, is, that the legislature could never have intended that what the individual candidate cannot do the political parties sponsoring him, or his friends and supporters, should be free to do. When a political party sponsoring a candidate incurs expenditure specifically in connection with his election, as distinguished from expen- diture on general party propaganda, and the candidate knowingly takes advantage of it or participates in the programme or activity or consents to it or acquiesces in it, it would be reasonable to infer, save in special circumstances, that he impliedly authorised the political party to incur such expenditure; and he cannot escape the rigors of the ceiling by saying that he has not incurred expenditure but big political party has done so. The party candidate does not stand apart from his political party and if the political party does not want its candidate to incur the disqualification it must exercise control over the expenditure which may be incurred by it directly to promote the poll prospects of the candidate. The same proposition must hold good in case of expenditure incurred by friends and supporters directly in connection with the election of the candidate. If a candidate were to be subject to the limitation of the ceiling but the political party sponsoring him or his friends' and supporters were to be free to spend as much as they like in connection with his election, the object of imposing a ceiling would be completely frustrated and the beneficent provision enacted in the interest of purity and genuineness of the democratic process would be wholly emasculated. [268A-F]Ranajaya Singh v. Baijnath Singh & Ors. [1955] 1 S.C.R. 671, Ram Dayal v. Brijraj Singh & Ors. [1970] 1 S.C.R. 530, Magraj Patodia v. R. K. Birla & Ors. [1971] 2 S.C.R. 118 and B. Rajagopala Rao v. N. G. Ranga, A.I.R. 1971 S.C. 266, referred to.In the present case, the first respondent's election to the Lok Sabha was challenged by the petitioner on various grounds, one of which wag that the first respondent incurred or authorised expenditure in excess of the prescribed limit of Rs. 10,000 in contravention of s. 77 and committed corrupt practice under s. 123(6). The High Court dismissed the election petition.Allowing the appeal to this Court, Held : (1) The total expenditure proved to have been incurred or authorised by the first respondent exceeded the prescribed limit and therefore his election should be set aside on the ground of corrupt practice defined in s. 123(6)[316F](a)A chart was furnished to the petitioner giving information as to the dates and places of the public meetings held in connection with the election of the first respondent and the names of the speakers who spoke at those public meetings. This chart was prepared in compliance with the directions of the trial court from the official records in the possession of the I.G. of Police. Therefore it is relevant and admissible in evidence under the first part of s. 35 of the Evidence Act. Though it is a weak type of evidence, and standing by itself cannot be regarded sufficient to establish the holding of a public meeting by the first respondent, it can be relied upon as a corroborative piece of evidence which may be considered along with other evidence in the case. The oral evidence thug corroborated, disclosed that in addition to the 23 public meetings admitted by the first respondent, 9 further public meetings were held on big behalf at various places.The first respondent not only suppressed the expenditure on these nine additional public meetings, but, also he suppressed the real expenditure on the admitted 23 public meetings. [281G-282C, G-283A, 293A-C, 301A-B](b)If the Court comes to the conclusion that' an item of expenditure has been suppressed in the return of election expenses, the mere fact that there is no sufficient evidence about the amount that must have been spent is no ground for ignoring the matter. It is the duty of the Court to asses all expenses as best as it 26 1 can though the court should not enter into the region of speculation or merely try to guess the amount that must have been spent. Generally it would be possible to arrive at an amount of expenditure on a conservative basis, and where it is possible to arrive at such an estimate, such estimated amount should be held as not shown by the candidate in his election account. [300E-G]Magraj Patodia v. R. K. Birla & Ors. [1971] 2 S.C.R. 11 8 and P. C. P. Reddiar v. S. Perumal, [1972] 2 S.C.R. 646 referred to.(c)The first respondent owned the responsibility for expenses in respect of the 23 public meetings admitted by him. He also admitted in his evidence that he "bore the expenses of all the election meetings in my constituency".Therefore, there is no scope for the argument that the expenses of any of these additional 9 public meetings were met by any Organisation or individual other than the first respondent. Even if the expenses of some of these nine public meetings were incurred by the District Pradesh Congress Committee or any other branch of the Congress orga- nisation which sponsored his candidature, or by any other friend or supporter, such expenses must be held to have been authorised by the first respondent because, he knowingly took advantage of such public meetings by participating in them and consented to, or at any rate, acquiesced in such expenses. [292E-H](2)It is not uncommon to find that during elections, posters and handbills are printed without complying with the requirement of section 127A, and sometimes containing scandalous material about rival candidates. There should therefore be some independent semi-judicial instrumentality set up by law, which would immediately investigate, even while the election fever is on and propaganda and canvassing are in progress and the evidence is raw and fresh, how the offending handbills and posters have come into existence.[314A-D]Rahim Khan v. Khurshid Ahmed & Ors. C.A. 816 of 1973, decided on August 8, 1974, followed.See the full content of this document
Extract
Kanwar Lal Gupta VS. Amar Nath Chawla & Ors.
PETITIONER: KANWAR LAL GUPTA Vs.RESPONDENT: AMAR NATH CHAWLA & ORS.DATE OF JUDGMENT03/10/1974BENCH: BHAGWATI, P.N.BENCH: BHAGWATI, P.N.SARKARIA, RANJIT SINGHCITATION: 1975 AIR 308 1975 SCR (2) 269 1975 SCC (3) 646CITATOR INFO : RF 1975 SC 349 (32)O 1975 SC2299 (113,119,120,249,490,493,495,4RF 1981 SC1068 (9)D 1985 SC1133 (2,3,6,8,14,17,21)RF 1987 SC1577 (21)ACT: Representation of the People Act (43 of 1951) ss. 77(1) and 123(6)-Expenses incurred by party sponsoring candidate in excess of the prescribed limit-If and when a corrupt Practice-Reform of election law suggested.JUDGMENT: CIVIL APPELLATE JURISDICTION : Civil. Appeal No. 1549 of 1972.Appeal from the Judgment & Order dated the 19th May, 1972 of the Delhi High Court in E.P. No. 2 of 1971.S. N. Marwaha, A. K Marwaha and K. C. Dua, for the appellant.M. N. Phadke, V. P. Nanda, N. S. Dass Bahl and D. N.Mishra, for respondent No. 1.The Judgment of the Court was delivered byBHAGWATI, J.-The controversy in this appeal relates to the validity of election to the Lok Sabha from the Sadar Parliamentary Constituency in the Union Territory of Delhi.Eleven candidates originally offered themselves for election from this constituency but out of them six withdrew their candidature with the result that only five remained in the field as contesting candidates. They were the petition and respondents. Nos. 1 to 4. The petitioner was put up as a candidate by the Jan Sangh, while the candidature of ...
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