Lok Prahari, Through Its General ... vs Union Of India

(b) is, in the case of a seat in the Council of States, not less than thirty years of age and, in the case of a seat in the House of the People, not less than twenty-five years of age; 6 Article 173. Qualification for membership of the State Legislature.- A person shall not be qualified to be chosen to fill a seat in the Legislature of a State unless he—

This Court directed disclosure of various facts including information regarding the assets and liabilities of the candidates at an election and their respective spouses and dependents (collectively hereafter referred to for the sake of convenience as ASSOCIATES):

(b) in any other case, in accordance with the directions or guidelines relating to assets classifications issued by the Reserve Bank;"

(m) the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988 (49 of 1988); shall be disqualified, where the convicted person is sentenced to-

(i) only fine, for a period of six years from the date of such conviction; 31 declares34 that a person convicted for an offence under the PC Act, 1988 is disqualified 35 both for being chosen or continuing as a LEGISLATOR.

INFORMATION TO THE VOTER:

50. No doubt, compelling a CANDIDATE to disclose the relevant information, would to an extent be a legal burden on the CANDIDATE’S constitutional right to contest an election. The question, therefore, would be whether it requires a statutory sanction to create such compulsion.

52. We shall now examine each one of the prayers in the writ petition and the feasibility of granting any relief thereon in the light of our above conclusions.

54. In prayer 1(1) 54 , the petitioner seeks a direction to respondent Nos.1 and 2 to make changes in Form 26 prescribed under Rule 4A of the RULES, which would provide for calling upon the CANDIDATES to declare their sources of income along with the sources of the income of their respective ASSOCIATES.

56. We shall now deal with prayer 1(3) which seeks three distinct reliefs. In our opinion, it would be more logical to deal with the relief sought in prayer 1(3)(ii) 55 first.

The 1st respondent is silent in its counter in this regard except making an omnibus claim and a general stand that all 55

57. We have already taken note of (i) the fact that increase in the assets of the LEGISLATORS and/or their ASSOCIATES disproportionate to the known sources of their respective incomes is, by compelling inference, a constitutionally impermissible conduct and may eventually constitute offences punishable under the PC Act and (ii) ‘undue influence’ within the meaning of Section 123 of the RP Act of 1951. In order to effectuate the constitutional and legal obligations of LEGISLATORS and their ASSOCIATES, their assets and sources of income are required to be continuously monitored to maintain the purity of the electoral process and integrity of the democratic structure of this country. Justice Louis D. Brandeis, perceptively observed: “the most important political office is that of the private citizen.”

60. Further, data so collected by the said mechanism, along with the analysis and recommendation, if any, as noted above should be placed in the public domain to enable the voters of 51 such LEGISLATOR to take an informed and appropriate decision, if such LEGISLATOR chooses to contest any election for any legislative body in future.

61. For the reasons mentioned above, we allow the prayer 1(3)(ii) of the 1st respondent.

62. In prayer 1(3)(i)56, the petitioner prays that an inquiry/ investigation be conducted into the “disproportionate increase in the assets” of the LEGISLATORS named in Annexure P-6 to the writ petition.

We are of the opinion that an inquiry/investigation such as the one sought for by the petitioner with reference to the named LEGISLATORS would amount to selective scrutiny of the matter in the absence of any permanent mechanism regularly monitoring the growth of the assets of all the LEGISLATORS and/or their ASSOCIATES as a class. Such a selective investigation could lead to political witch-hunting. We, therefore, decline this relief, at this stage. 56

xxx xxx xxx (3) to respondents no.3 to 5 to-

(i) conduct inquiry/investigation into disproportionate increase in the assets of MPs/MLAs/MLCs included in list in Annexure P6 to the WP, 52

64. For the very same logic as adopted by this Court in Krishnamoorthy, we are also of the opinion that the non- disclosure of assets and sources of income of the CANDIDATES and their ASSOCIATES would constitute a corrupt practice falling under heading ‘undue influence’ as defined under Section 123(2) of the RP Act of 1951. We, therefore, allow prayer No.2.

65. Coming to Prayer No. 4, the petitioner is only seeking information regarding the contracts, if any with the appropriate government either by the candidate or his/her spouse and dependants.

54 “..information about the contracts with appropriate Government and any public company by the candidate, his/her spouse and dependents directly or by Hindu undivided family/trust/partnership firm(s)/private company (companies) in which the candidate and his spouse and dependents have a share or interest shall also be provided in the affidavit in Form 26 prescribed under the Rules.”

66. In the light of the foregoing discussion, the information such as the one required under the above-mentioned prayer is certainly relevant information in the context of disqualification on the ground of undue accretion of assets, therefore, we see no objection for granting the relief as prayed for.

67. We are left with the reliefs sought by way of prayer No. 5 in I.A. No. 8 of 2016. The petitioner seeks Form 26 be amended to provide certain further information. An analysis of the information sought (as can be seen from the prayer) indicates that all the information is in the context of statutorily prescribed disqualifications under the RP Act of 1951. In our opinion, such information would certainly be relevant and necessary for a voter to make an appropriate choice at the time of the election whether to vote or not in favour of a particular candidate. Therefore, all the six prayers made in I.A. No. 8 are allowed.

68. The writ petition is allowed as indicated above, but, in the circumstances, without any costs.