The Gauhati High Court has issued summons to Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Member of Parliament Kripanath Mallah in an election petition filed by Congress candidate and Senior Advocate Hafiz Rashid Ahmed Choudhury, who was defeated in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls.
A single bench of Justice Sanjay Kumar Medhi issued the summons on the plea, which alleges that Mallah employed ‘corrupt practices’ to win the 2024 general elections from Assam’s Karimganj parliamentary constituency. Mallah had defeated Choudhury by a margin of 18,360 votes, a difference of 1.6 percent.
Choudhury, in his plea, claims that Mallah committed multiple ‘corrupt practices’ both during the campaign and on election day. According to the plea, Mallah was involved in widespread rigging and booth capturing, including intimidating voters through undue influence and bribery. The allegations include booth capturing across 47 polling stations, which constitutes almost double the number of votes than the margin between the two candidates.
Choudhury also alleges that several complaints were made to the election agent and the Election Commission of India (ECI), but no action was taken. He further raised concerns about the integrity of the voting process, noting discrepancies in the voter turnout data. The ECI had stated that 11,36,538 votes were polled, which, after adding postal ballots, totaled 11,43,796 votes. However, on the day of counting, the total number of votes counted was 11,47,607, resulting in an unexplained additional 3,811 votes being counted.
The court has scheduled the next hearing for August 19, 2024.
