Himachal High Court issues notice to Kangana Ranaut, asks for reply by August 21
The membership of Bollywood actress Kangana Ranaut, who became BJP MP from Mandi, has been challenged in the Himachal High Court. This challenge was given by Layak Ram Negi, a resident of Kinnaur district. He has demanded cancellation of the election. On the petition of Layak Ram Negi, the High Court has issued a notice to Kangana on Wednesday. Judge Jyotsna Rewal Dua has asked Kangana, who has been made a respondent, to respond by August 21.
Ranaut won the Mandi Lok Sabha seat by defeating her nearest rival Congress candidate Vikramaditya Singh by a margin of 74,755 votes. He got 5,37,002 votes as against Singh’s 4,62,267 votes. Seeking cancellation of Ranaut’s election, petitioner Layak Ram Negi said that his nomination papers were wrongly canceled by the Election Officer (Deputy Commissioner, Mandi) and he has also been made a party.
According to Layak Ram Negi, he had filed nomination from Mandi for the Lok Sabha elections on May 14, 2024. Negi says that after premature retirement from the forest department, he submitted the no dues certificate issued by the forest department to the election officer along with the nomination papers.
During this, he was told that he would also have to submit no dues certificates for electricity, water and telephone issued by the concerned departments independently for the government residence. He was given time till the next day to submit these certificates. The nomination papers were to be scrutinized on 15 May.
On this day, he submitted the no dues certificates for electricity, water and telephone issued by the departments to the returning officer, but he refused to accept them and said that not attaching them in the nomination is a big mistake, which cannot be rectified now and rejected his nomination. Due to this, he could not contest the election.
According to Layak Ram Negi, this was not a big mistake, due to which his nomination would be rejected. Negi argued that if his papers had been accepted, he could have won the election and said that Kangana’s election should be cancelled.
