New Delhi: The Supreme Court Tuesday deferred the final hearing of a petition filed by Congress MLA from Sundargarh, Jogesh Kumar Singh, challenging the Orissa High Court order declaring his election null and void to next week.
A two-judge bench comprising Justices AK Sikri and S Abdul Nazeer adjourned the matter for a week after the counsel for the appellant sought time to file rejoinder on the counter affidavit filed by respondents.
Earlier, the counsel appearing for respondents, Sanjeev Kumar Panigrahi filed a counter affidavit in the apex court mentioning that the Congress MLA does not belong to ST category, but to the general category.
It may be mentioned here that the Orissa High Court had declared the election of Congress MLA Jogesh Kumar Singh from Sundargarh, which is reserved for Scheduled Tribe candidates, as null and void January 30 last year.
While adjudicating two petitions filed by the defeated BJP MLA Sahadev Xaxa and an electorate Ajay Patel, Justice BK Nayak of the Orissa High Court set aside the election of the Congress MLA for submitting a false caste certificate. The petitioners had alleged that Singh had submitted a fake caste certificate while filing his nomination in the 2014 Assembly elections.
Singh submitted a certificate stating he belonged to the ‘Khandayat Bhuyan’ caste, which is not included in the list of Scheduled Tribes.
Jogesh had approached the apex court in the matter which gave him interim relief February 13 last year by issuing a stay order on the Orissa High Court’s decision to dismiss him from Sundargarh Assembly constituency.