E-Paper
Delhi court junks plea on Sonia Gandhi's electoral roll inclusion before Indian citizenship
The plea alleged Sonia Gandhi's name was included in the electoral rolls three years before she became an Indian citizen.
A Delhi court has dismissed a plea seeking action against Congress leader Sonia Gandhi, alleging her name was included in the electoral rolls three years before she became an Indian citizen.
The plea had accused the Congress Parliamentary Party Chairperson of of forging documents to get herself enrolled in the voters' list before obtaining Indian citizenship.
Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate (ACJM) Vaibhav Chaurasiya reserved the order in the case on Wednesday, after hearing arguments and putting forward some queries for the complainant's counsel.
The petitioner's counsel had argued that the inclusion of Gandhi's name in the electoral roll in 1980-81 was irregular, adding that she was not an Indian citizen at that time.
They submitted that the “first threshold to be enrolled as a voter” was having an Indian citizenship, with the second being an address proof.
“In January 1980, she was not a citizen of India. How then could her name be included in the electoral rolls?,” senior advocate Pavan Narang argued on behalf of the petitioner.
Narang further submitted that Gandhi's name was deleted from the electoral roll in 1982, and was added again in 1983, following her becoming an Indian citizen.
During the arguments, Narang also cited the 1985 Allahabad High Court ruling in Rakesh Singh vs Sonia Gandhi, which had acknowledged that the Congress leader had become an Indian citizen on April 30, 1983.
