THE HON’BLE SRI JUSTICE SANJAY KUMAR WRIT PETITION NO.4460 OF 2007 DATED 15TH APRIL, 2011 BETWEEN Simhadri Ramanamma …Petitioner And Kunjam Lakshmi and others. …Respondents THE HON’BLE SRI JUSTICE SANJAY KUMAR WRIT PETITION NO.4460 OF 2007 ORDER: The petitioner was elected as the Sarpanch, Molleru Gram Panchayat, Gangavaram Mandal, East Godavari District, on 29.07.2006. The first respondent herein filed Election Petition No.8 of 2006 before the Election Tribunal-cum-Agency Divisional Officer, Rampachodavaram, calling in question the said election on the ground that invalid votes polled in favour of the petitioner had been counted and thereby, she was declared elected with a margin of 15 votes. The first respondent accordingly sought verification of the polled votes with counterfoils, recounting of the votes and verification of the invalid votes. Thereupon, the Election Tribunal passed order dated 17.02.2007 in the main E.P., directing recounting of the votes by the Mandal Parishad Development Officer, Gangavaram, after due notice to the parties. Aggrieved thereby, the petitioner approached this Court by way of the present writ petition. This Court, by order dated 06.03.2007, while admitting the writ petition granted interim suspension of the order passed by the Election Tribunal. Perusal of the order under challenge reflects that basing upon the pleadings and the oral arguments of the parties, the Election Tribunal straight away directed recounting of the votes. This is not in keeping with the law laid down by this Court. In LAGUDU ANURADHA v. GORREPOTU CHELLAYYAMMA[1], this Court, while observing that though it was open to the Election Tribunal to decide all the issues in controversy or choose to decide a preliminary issue, be it in relation to recounting or otherwise, held that Order XIV of the Code of Civil Procedure would be applicable even in the case of such proceedings and therefore, the Tribunal could not order recounting in the main E.P., without first settling all the issues and recording the evidence. In the present case, such an exercise was not undertaken by the Election Tribunal prior to directing the recounting of the votes. That apart, in the light of the specific stand of the Returning Officer that the first respondent had not sought recounting of the votes in accordance with Rule 60 of the Andhra Pradesh Panchayat Raj (Conduct of Elections) Rules, 2006, the Election Tribunal ought to have looked into the effect of such failure on the part of the first respondent before ordering the recount. The order under challenge therefore suffers from more than one defect. The Writ Petition is accordingly allowed setting aside the order dated 17.02.2007 passed by the Election Tribunal-cum-Agency Divisional Officer, Rampachodavaram, in E.P.No.8 of 2006. The matter is remitted to the said Tribunal for disposal afresh in accordance with law within three (3) months from the date of receipt of a copy of this order. No order as to costs. ____________________ SANJAY KUMAR, J. 15TH APRIL, 2011. VGSR/PGS [1] 2004 (3) ALD 610