The Orissa High Court Wednesday ordered a fresh poll in the state’s Athgarh assembly constituency, a lawyer said.<\/p>\n
Justice R.N Biswal passed the order at Cuttack, some 26 km from here, in response to a petition by senior ruling Biju Janata Dal (BJD) leader and former state minister Ranendra Pratap Swain, challenging the rejection of his nomination papers by a returning officer.<\/p>\n
Swain had filed nomination papers as a BJD candidate seeking election to the state assembly from the Athgarh constituency in Cuttack district in 2009.<\/p>\n
His petition, filed in the high court in July 2009, alleged that the returning officer at Athgarh illegally cancelled his nomination papers and he could not contest the election.<\/p>\n
“The Orissa High Court set aside the order of the returning officer. It ordered a re-poll in view of the casual vacancy that arose because of the voidable election of Ramesh Rout, an independent candidate,” Swain’s lawyer Pitambar Acharya said.<\/p>\n
Swain, who was elected to the state assembly from the same constituency for four consecutive terms from 1990 to 2009, said: “It was a historical judgment. The court has given justice to me.”<\/p>\n
Swain was state science and technology minister 2000-2002, sports and youth service minister 2000-2004 and housing minister 2002-2004.<\/p>\n
Rout, who had won the election as an independent with the support of the BJD, said he will move the Supreme Court against the judgment.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Orissa High Court Wednesday ordered a fresh poll in the state’s Athgarh assembly constituency, a lawyer said. Justice R.N Biswal passed the order at Cuttack, some 26 km from here, in response to a petition by senior ruling Biju Janata Dal (BJD) leader and former state minister Ranendra Pratap Swain, challenging the rejection of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[426,424,425],"class_list":["post-5720","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-top-law-news","tag-assembly","tag-fresh-poll","tag-orissa"],"yoast_head":"\n