SC to hear PIL tomm to debar jail inmates from fighting elections

New Delhi, July 29 (UNI) The Supreme Court will consider tomorrow a Public Interest Litigation (PIL) seeking to debar all jail inmates from the election arena in terms of Section 62(V) of the Representation of the People Act.

The petition filed by advocate Z K Faizan will be heard by a bench headed by Chief Justice K G Balakrishnan.

Mr Faizan, in his petition, contended that when a person in jail or police custody was disqualified from voting in any election, then how such a person could be allowed to contest the election.

According to the petitioner, in order to prevent the entry of criminals in the election arena, the court must decide the important issue whether a person who lost his voting right should be allowed to contest election from jail or not.

At present, about 100 MPs and MLAs are in prison and many among them have contested and won elections from there. Prominent among them are -- former Union Minister Shibhu Soren, RJD MPs Mohammed Shahbuddin and Pappu Yadav, independent MLA Amarmani Tripathi and BJP MP Babu Bhai Katara.

The petitioner also appealed to the court, ''not to allow the MPs and MLAs in jail to participate in the Presidential and the Vice Presidential polls.'' The request was, however, turned down by the apex court.

UNI