The petitioner and respondents Nos. l to 3 contested election for National Assembly seat from Constituency No. 118 (Multan/Lodhran-5) in the General Elections held on 6-10-1993. According to count, prepared by the Returning Officer, respondent No.2 polled 364 votes, respondent No.3 1960 votes, respondent No. 1 172787 votes, whereas the petitioner polled 55195 votes. Respondent No. 1 having been found to have polled highest number of votes, therefore, was declared a returned candidate. His election has been challenged in this Election Petition. The main grounds urged by the petitioner in this petition are:--
(a) That according to law respondent No. l was defaulter in respect of a loan obtained by the company in which he was one of the share-- holders/members.
(b) He having stood surety as guarantor for the payment of said loan due from the Company, therefore, was himself in his personal capacity a debtor as such a defaulter.
(c) He filed a false affidavit before respondent No.6 in which he concealed the factum of his being a defaulter.
(d) He committed a criminal act of stealing pledged stock from the custody of National Bank of Pakistan regarding which the Regional Head, Multan, sought permission of Chief of National Bank of Pakistan, Punjab, for lodging an F.I.R. With F.I.A. On this account and also on account of his having violated the hypothecation agreement with the National Bank of Pakistan, he did not remain "Ameen" and honest person.
2. The election petition has been contested by respondent No. l who has filed written statement in which the allegations have been specifically denied. A preliminary objection has been raised that neither the election petition nor the documents annexed therewith have been verified in accordance with law, therefore, the same were allowed to be rejected on that score alone.
3. I have examined the documents appended with this petition and find that none of them have been verified at all. However, separately an affidavit in general terms in respect of all the documents annexed with the petition, has been filed, in which it has been stated that contents of all the documents are verified as correct to the best of petitioner's knowledge and belief.
4. The petitioner wants to reply the documents appended with the election petition as substantial evidence in support of the aforementioned allegations made in the election petition, therefore, the said documents were required to be verified as provided in subsection (3) of section 55 of the Representation of the People Act, 1976, which is mandatory, for failure to comply with the same is to be visited with the penalty of dismissal of the election petition as ordained by section 63(a) of the said Act.
5. It has been held in case reported as Muhammad Ibrahim v. Muhammad Arif Sardar (1986 CLC 2050) and S. Yousaf A.I Shah v. The Election Tribunal, West Pakistan, Lahore and 2 others (PLD 1967 Peshawar 207) that each document annexed with the election petition is required to be separately verified and verification in general terms through one separate affidavit in respect of all the documents was not legally permissible. In this view of the matter the election petition is liable to be dismissed for failure of the petitioner to comply with the provisions of section 53(3) of the Representation of the People Act, 1976. In this case the said provision of law can be pressed into service with greater force for very serious allegations have been made in the election petition as regards reputation, honesty and the right of respondent No. l to contest the election. The law provided that each document should be verified so that the petitioner should own the responsibility arising from the act of making allegations against a candidate who has been returned.
6. Apart from what has been discussed above, the nature of allegations in the petition are such which in the facts and circumstances of this case can be disposed of with reference to the documents placed on the record by the petitioner himself, Manager of National Bank of Pakistan, Main Branch, Multan, has been impleaded as respondent No.4 who is represented by a counsel.
7. Learned counsel for respondent No.4 says that no F.I.R. Has been lodged by the Bank with the F.I.A.
Regarding stealing of hypothecated stock as alleged by the petitioner against respondent No. 1. It has been held in case reported as Abdur Rauf Khan v. Haji M. Nawaz Khan and 2 others (1986 M LD 2338) and Raja Muhammad Afzal v. Ch. Muhammad Altaf Hussain and others (1986 SCM R 1736) that merely because a number of cases had been registered against a candidate through F.I.R.
Was no ground to hold that he-was not honest or Ameen in order to disqualify him from contesting the elections, therefore, even if an F.I.R. Had been lodged against respondent No.1 in view of the principle laid down in these judgments he would not have been disqualified from contesting election, therefore, this ground has no bearing to sustain the allegations.
8. The loan was obtained by the company in which respondent No. l and his wife are shareholders according to the list of shareholders (Form-A) placed on the record by the petitioner himself.
According to the document there are in all 42,75,200 shares out of which respondent No. l and his wife are holders of 5,00,000 shares each. Total shareholding of petitioner and his wife comes to 10,00,000 out of 42,75,200 shares, therefore, their shareholding is less than 51 % in the Company.
According to Ordinance XX of 1993 any person holding less than 51 % shares in a Company which is a defaulter in regard to loan obtained by the said Company, was not disqualified to contest elections as he in his personal capacity was traded in such circumstances not to fall within the definition of a defaulter. As regards respondent No. l having stood surety for the payment of the loan obtained by the Company is concerned, there is no document on the record to establish this.
Learned counsel for petitioner insisted that in the surety form respondent no. l acknowledged himself to be the debtor directly, as such, this should be treated to be a case of a debt having been obtained by respondent No. l himself and not the Company.
9. There is no document appended with the petition to establish this, therefore, the petitioner cannot be allowed to lead even evidence in regard thereto according to rules. However, learned counsel for respondent No.4 submitted that there was no such undertaking by respondent No. 1, whereas he was just a guarantor. This being so a guarantor according to established law cannot be treated to principal debtor as stated by learned counsel for the petitioner.
10. Learned counsel for petitioner submitted that respondent No. l also made a false statement regarding his resignation from directorship of the Company. It is evident from document placed by the petitioner himself on the record regarding particulars of the Directors filed with the Registrar of the Company on 8-8-1993 that an entry has been made in such document that he had resigned from directorship from 13-4-1993. Apart from this the petitioner has also placed on record the copy of resignation sent by respondent No. l on 10-4-1993, therefore, there was no mis-statement on his part as regards his resignation with effect from 13-4-1993.
11. Learned counsel for petitioner submitted that a reference under President's (Post-Proclamation)
Order No. 17 of 1977, was pending against respondent No. l before Special Court, therefore, he was disqualified to contest election as serious allegations had been made against him to disqualify him from contesting election as member of any of the Assemblies, as such, he could not be held to be as Ameen. On the same principles as laid down by the Superior Courts that mere registration of case was no ground to disqualify a person from contesting election, this ground is also not tenable.
Additionally the said reference against respondent No. 1 was ultimately decided in his favour and answered in the negative and he was exonerated from the charges levelled against him by the Special Court by holding that he was not guilty of mis-conduct. This ground is not available and was not available at any stage of the election process.
12. For the foregoing reasons the election petition has no force which is hereby dismissed, with no order as to costs.