Patil, Shekhawat remain in Prez fray after scrutiny

New Delhi, July 2: The nomination papers of UPA-Left nominee Pratibha Patil and NDA-supported Independent candidate Bhairon Singh Shekhawat were found in order today for the July 19 Presidential election while others were rejected after scrutiny of papers.

Talking to newspersons, Returning Officer (RO) P D T Achary said of the 84 nominations received this year, only four sets of nominaton papers belonging to Ms Patil and two sets filed by Mr Shekhawat were found valid in all respects and thus had been accepted.

The office rejected all but six sets of nomination papers and declared them ''invalid'' after scrutiny of the nomination papers, he added.

Mr Achary said there was a need for amending the laws so that the Presidential election could be reserved for serious candidates only.

He said there were four criterion for rejecting the nominations but the RO did not enjoy all those powers at the time of accepting them.

''This leads to participation of a number of non-serious candidates at the time of filing of nomination papers just for the sake of publicity. Such a situation can easily be avoided by amending the law through Parliament,'' Mr Achary said.

He said presently a candidate was needed to submit a certified copy of the electoral roll displaying his/her name, Rs 15,000 as deposit, 50 names of MPs or MLAs proposing and seconding their candidature. But even if a candidate just provided the electoral roll, his nomination was accepted and it would remain valid till the date of the scrutiny, he added.

Asked about providing security to the two candidates, Mr Achary said since Mr Shekhawat was the Vice-President, he was already under security cover but for Ms Patil the matter would be taken up with the Election Commission.

Responding to questions, Mr Achary said as many as seven candidates' security deposit would be refunded but the process to refund will be handled by the Election Commission.

Pointing towards the non-seriousness of candidates, the RO said some of the candidates had provided the names of 50 proposers and seconders but they were neither MPs nor MLAs.

A candidate Mohan Ramayni of Dhatia, Madhya Pradesh had even given the name of Lord Rama and Sita Mata as his proposer and Lankapati as his seconder while another candidate Mr Satish from Haryana has said that the Raisina Hills belonged to the Malcha Panchayat and supplied the signature of the entire panchayat in support of his candidature, the RO added.

UNI

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