Supreme Court bars Article 32 challenge to rejected Rajya Sabha nomination

A bench of Justices Prashant Kumar Mishra and Atul S. Chandurkar held that Article 329(b) bars writ relief against nomination rejection, leaving an election petition as the only remedy.

The Supreme Court on 12 June 2026 dismissed a writ petition under Article 32 challenging the rejection of a candidate’s nomination for a Rajya Sabha seat from Madhya Pradesh. A bench of Justices Prashant Kumar Mishra and Atul S. Chandurkar held that the bar in Article 329(b) of the Constitution prevents any court from entertaining such a dispute while the election is in progress. The petitioner, Meenakshi Natarajan, an Indian National Congress candidate, had her nomination rejected by the Returning Officer on 9 June 2026 on the ground that she suppressed material information about a pending criminal case in her Form 26 affidavit. The Court ruled that her only remedy lies in an election petition before the concerned High Court. The order matters because it reaffirms that nomination rejections cannot be litigated mid-election through Article 32 or Article 226.

How the dispute reached the Court

The Returning Officer rejected the nomination on the basis that Natarajan had not disclosed the pendency of a criminal case in her Form 26 affidavit, treating that as suppression of material information through an incomplete affidavit. The order recorded that the court had taken cognizance of a criminal complaint against her, that summons had been issued, and that she had filed her statement before the Magisterial court — so she had full knowledge of the pending case.

According to the petitioner, after the rejection she approached the Election Commission of India and made a written representation and argued in person on 10 June 2026, but no orders were passed. She then moved the Supreme Court directly.

The competing positions on maintainability

Dr Abhishek Manu Singhvi, Senior Counsel for the petitioner, argued at the outset that the Article 329(b) bar was not attracted because the petitioner sought completion of the election process in a fair and transparent manner, with no motive to thwart it. On the merits, he submitted that Section 33A of the Representation of the People Act, 1951 requires disclosure only of cases where a candidate is accused of an offence punishable with imprisonment of two years or more in a pending case in which a charge has been framed. Since cognizance was yet to be taken and charges yet to be framed, there was no violation, making the rejection illegal and arbitrary.

He relied on Mohinder Singh Gill v. The Chief Election Commissioner, Election Commission of India v. Ashok Kumar, and Manda Jaganath v. K.S. Rathnam to contend that the Constitution does not bar an election-related dispute where the relief sought is the smooth completion of the election rather than its obstruction.

Opposing, Shri Mukul Rohatgi for the private respondents, Shri Dama Seshadri Naidu for the Election Commission, and Solicitor General Tushar Mehta for the intervenor State of Madhya Pradesh challenged both the prayer and the maintainability. They argued that the right to contest an election is a statutory right, and a petition under Article 32 — available only when a fundamental right is infringed — was not maintainable. They placed reliance on the settled line beginning with N.P. Ponnuswami v. Returning Officer, Namakkal Constituency, contending that where a nomination is rejected on any ground, the only remedy is an election petition, with no jurisdiction in the High Court under Article 226 or the Supreme Court under Article 32.

What the Court held on the disclosure obligation

The Court set out Article 329, Section 33A of the 1951 Act, Rule 4A of the Conduct of Election Rules, 1961, and Clause (5) of Form 26. The respondents argued that the candidate had to disclose all pending criminal cases at whatever stage, not only cases where cognizance has been taken or charges framed, and that non-disclosure warranted under Clause (5) of Form 26 would entail rejection.

The Court referred to its recent judgment in Poonam v. Dule Singh, authored by Justice Atul S. Chandurkar, which dealt with non-disclosure of a previous conviction under Section 138 of the Negotiable Instruments Act, 1881 by a candidate for Councillor in a Nagar Parishad, holding that every candidate must furnish the prescribed information in the relevant format.

The reasoning on the Article 329(b) bar

The Court relied on Ponnuswami, which held that the word “election” in Part XV carries a wide meaning, connoting the entire process culminating in a candidate being declared elected, and that the improper rejection of a nomination paper is significant only as a ground to call the election in question through an election petition. The words “notwithstanding anything in this Constitution” in Article 329 exclude the jurisdiction of the High Court to interfere while elections are in progress.

The bench recorded that the principles in Ponnuswami have been followed in all election-related disputes, and that constitutional courts have rejected attempts to invoke writ jurisdiction to interject during the election process.

Singhvi pressed that where the illegality in rejection is glaring and manifest, the Court must step in to preserve the sanctity of the election process. The Court declined. It reasoned that distinguishing glaring cases fit for Article 32 or Article 226 from cases relegated to an election petition would read into Article 329 a principle it does not contain. Such an interpretation, the Court said, would be in direct conflict with Ponnuswami and should not be encouraged.

Order

The Court held it was not inclined to entertain the petition under Article 32 in view of the express bar in Article 329(b), and the writ petition was dismissed. The bench clarified that any observation on the basis of rejection was only for appreciating the facts and would not affect any election petition that the petitioner or any other person may file before the concerned High Court, which would be decided on its own merits in accordance with law. Pending applications were disposed of.