CHENNAI: In a setback to TVK, the Madras High Court on Tuesday temporarily restrained R Seenivasa Sethupathi, the party’s MLA-elect from Tirupattur in Sivaganga who won by just one vote, from participating in Assembly proceedings, including the trust vote.
A division bench of justices L Victoria Gowri and N Senthilkumar granted the “limited interim injunction” on the writ petitions filed by former minister and senior DMK leader KR Periakaruppan who lost to Sethupathi by a lone vote.
He had sought the court to restrain Seenivasa Sethupathi from participating in the Assembly proceedings since one postal ballot belonging to Tirupattur constituency in Sivaganga district was wrongly dispatched to Tirupattur segment in Tirupattur district.
The court clarified the interim order shall not be construed as setting aside the election of Seenivasa Sethupathi nor shall it be treated as conferring any right upon the petitioner to be declared as elected.
The bench directed the authorities concerned to preserve all records relating to counting of votes in Tirupattur constituency in Sivaganga district and said the alleged wrongly sent postal ballot shall be identified, sealed, secured and preserved separately without opening or tampering with.
It asked the respondent election authorities including the chief electoral officer and Sethupathi to file counter-affidavits on or before June 19, 2026 and accordingly adjourned the matters. “The floor test is not an ordinary legislative sitting.
Participation in a floor test may determine the survival or fall of a government. If the sixth respondent (Seenivasa Sethupathi) participates in such proceedings and his vote becomes decisive, the consequence may travel far beyond the constituency and affect the constitutional governance of the state,” the bench observed.
It held the balance of convenience, in the peculiar facts of this case, lies in preserving constitutional neutrality and no prejudice of an irreversible nature would be caused to Seenivasa Sethupathi if he is temporarily restrained from participating in the floor test.
On the contrary, if he is permitted to participate and his vote becomes decisive, the injury caused to the petitioner and to the purity of the electoral process may be incapable of meaningful correction, it said.
Referring to maintainability of writ petitions on election related cases, the bench said the powers under Article 226 of the Constitution being couched in the widest possible terms, ‘cannot remain wholly eclipsed’ where the court is confronted with a ‘manifest administrative aberration’ capable of undermining the ‘purity’ of the electoral process.
If the allegation of wrong dispatch of a postal ballot is proved, it would involve a ‘jurisdictional defect’, it commented. The bench said the conduct of the RO of Tirupattur segment in Tirupattur district ‘reflects a disturbing lapse’ and the rejection of the vote without restorative administrative measures, defeats the very checks and balances.
The Supreme Court will hear the MLA’s plea, challenging the HC order, on Wednesday.
