New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Friday dismissed a plea seeking legal action against Prime Minister Narendra Modi for allegedly filing a defective affidavit relating to his marital status during the 2012 Gujarat assembly elections. A bench headed by justice J. Chelameswar rejected the plea filed by an Ahmedabad resident who had challenged the Gujarat high court order which refused to entertain his plea on the ground that it lacked merit.
The complaint filed by Nishant Varma in April 2014 had sought a first information report (FIR) against Modi for “hiding” his marital status in the affidavit he had filed with his nomination for 2012 assembly polls (when Modi was the Chief Minister of Gujarat) for the Maninagar seat. Verma had further contended that when Modi contested the Lok Sabha election in 2014, he mentioned his wife’s name in the affidavit for the first time, disclosing the earlier omission.
Thus, Modi, in 2012, had committed an offence under section 125(A)(3) of Representation of People Act, he said. Section 125 A(3) deals with concealment of information while filing affidavit and provides for imprisonment up to six months. The high court had on 3 July dismissed the petition demanding legal action against Modi and set aside the lower court’s finding that the offence had been committed but no action could be taken as the petition was filed after a delay of more than one year.
