SC dismisses ex-BSF jawan Tej Bahadur’s plea against rejection of nomination

SC dismisses sacked BSF jawan Tej Bahadur’s plea challenging EC scrapping his Varanasi nomination for LS polls

The Supreme Court has dismissed sacked BSF jawan Tej Bahadur’s plea challenging Election Commission’s decision to scrap his Varanasi nomination for Lok Sabha polls.

Tej Bahadur, part of the BSF’s 29th Battalion, had posted a video on social media showing poor food arrangements at his camp on the border. (Facebook/Tej Bahadur Yadav)

Tej Bahadur Yadav, who moved the Supreme Court on May 6, termed the decision of the poll panel discriminatory and unreasonable and said it should be set aside.

Tej Bahadur Yadav’s nomination papers were rejected because he had slipped up on the paperwork. A government employee dismissed from services within the last five years needs to produce a certificate from the Election Commission to certify that dismissal wasn’t due to disloyalty to the country or corruption.

Yadav was sacked from BSF for his video complaining about the food in 2017.

In a surprise announcement last week, the Samajwadi Party had replaced Shalini Yadav with Tej Bahadur Yadav to contest against Prime Minister Narendra Modi from Varanasi.

PM Modi had won the seat in 2014 with a 56 per cent share of the votes polled. Ajai Rai was a distant third with 7 per cent votes; Aam Aadmi Party’s Arvind Kejriwal was second with 20 per cent votes.

Tej Bahadur Yadav had announced his decision to file his papers from Varanasi as an Independent last month. He had had said there were multiple offers to him from political parties to contest on their ticket.