Siddu's counsel wants ‘cut-paste’ petition against him dismissed

Bengaluru, NT Bureau: Chief Minister Siddaramaiah’s counsel on Thursday argued before the Karnataka High Court (HC) that the election petition against him was a “cut and paste” job and should therefore be dismissed.

The plea had alleged that the five guarantees that the Congress had announced before last year’s elections amounted to bribery and corrupt practices under the Representation of People’s Act.

Advocate Ravivarma Kumar, who was representing the CM, told Justice Sunil Dutt Yadav that there were at least three election petitions with identical wording.

“The most disturbing aspect of this case is recently, a coordinate bench of this Court in B Lakshmidevi's case, an election petition was rejected for want of cause of action in an identical situation. To our shock, we found that my election petition is the same as the election petition against this one,” Kumar said.

“Cut and paste, paragraph by paragraph! So it is easy for me to apply this as binding precedent. But I am appealing to the Court to take judicial notice of this fact that there has been mass copying of election petitions. At least three I have identified. The first was before Kalaburagi Bench. Same averments, not a comma or full stop changed in petition,” he added.

A similar petition against Congress MLA from Shivajinagar Rizwan Arshad had been dismissed back in March.

Justice Dutt Yadav has asked Kumar to produce the documents pertaining to the relevant case (B Lakshmidevi) before the Court and he has agreed to do the same.