Four candidates who lost Gujarat polls move High Court, seek review of results

AHMEDABAD: Four candidates who lost the 2022 Assembly election approached the Gujarat High Court seeking to review the results.

The petitioners were two candidates of the Gujarat Congress Lalit Kagthra and Raghu Desai and two candidates of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Harshad Ribdia and Hitesh Vasava.

The petition was filed under the Representation of the People Act, of 1951. The results of the Gujarat assembly elections were declared in December 2022. 

In a conversation with The New Indian Express, Lalit Kagathara, the Congress candidate who lost the Tankara seat, said, “At the time of the election, there were several errors in the affidavit of the BJP candidate Durabh Vekaria. I had brought this to the notice of the Returning Officer (RO) at that time. But the RO declined to look into my complaint properly.”

"There were many errors in Durhabbhai's form; I pointed out to the RO that the BJP candidate had left blank more than 13 columns in his form which required answers and had given some wrong information. He gave his educational qualification as SSC without mentioning the year in which he passed which is mandatory," said Lalit.

"Apart from this, he has not given the bank account details. He didn't disclose his income tax returns; he didn't give proper details about the immovable property as well,” he added.

BJP's Visavdar candidate Harshad Ribdia has submitted in his application that the winning Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) candidate Bhupendra Bhayani has not mentioned the details of cases registered against him about corruption and fraud in his affidavit, besides this, he has also hidden the details of his sons owning factories.

Congress candidate Raghu Desai said in his application that after the voting we have been given a certificate of 58% voting but at 10 pm the election officer declared 64% voting.

In the petition, the petitioners have made the Election Commission and Returning Officer, a party.