High Court dismisses Jaya Prada’s plea against Azam’s election
Jaya Prada, who lost the election from Rampur in Uttar Pradesh, had sought a court direction to set aside Khan’s election as MP and declare her elected as the Lok Sabha member from Rampur instead.
The Lucknow bench of the Allahabad high court on Friday dismissed actress-turned-politician Jaya Prada’s plea filed against Mohd Azam Khan challenging his election as MP from Rampur Lok Sabha constituency.
Jaya Prada, who lost the election from Rampur in Uttar Pradesh, had sought a court direction to set aside Khan’s election as MP and declare her elected as the Lok Sabha member from Rampur instead.
The petitioner sought a direction in the nature of quo warranto, thereby asking Azam as to under what authority of law he was holding the office of MP despite holding an office of profit in the form of chancellor of Maulana Jauhar Ali University.
For the first time since his registration in 1984, Amar Singh, Member of Parliament, also appeared as a counsel for Jaya Prada in this case. He submitted that it was a sensitive matter related to the issue of holding double office of profit.
Opposing the petition, the counsel for the Election Commission of India OP Srivastava raised a preliminary objection on the point of maintainability of the petition.
He said in election matters only election petition could be filed as per law. Hence, this writ petition was not maintainable, he said.
The issue of jurisdiction of hearing the petition at the Lucknow bench was also raised as the matter was related to Rampur parliamentary constituency of UP.
After the hearing, the court dismissed the petition observing:“The court is not inclined to entertain this writ petition filed under Article 226 of the Constitution of India”.
On Friday, Jaya Prada, along with her counsel Amar Singh, remained present in court no.7 up to 4 pm. Hearing on the case started at 3.45 pm.