In a significant ruling, the Odisha High Court on Monday dismissed a miscellaneous petition of Titilagarh BJD MlA Tukuni Sahu and imposed a cost of Rs15,000 on her for wasting the court’s time during adjudication of an election petition. last year, the High Court had also twice imposed fines of Rs10,000 and Rs5,000 on Sahu in October and November, respectively, for seeking unnecessary adjournments and not responding to the court’s notices in stipulated time in the election petition filed by former MlA and Congress leader Surendra Singh Bhoi.
Bhoi has challenged the election of Sahu stating that the processes of election and counting of votes in the Titilagarh constituency were not held properly in April-May last year. Polling 57,836 votes, Bhoi lost to the BJD candidate by a margin of 14,022 votes. While Sahu was asked to file her written statement in response to Bhoi’s petition, she preferred to file a miscellaneous petition in the court seeking to quash Bhoi’s petition. Terming this as an act of impediment to the judicial process, Justice Biswanath Rath dismissed the MlA’s plea and imposed the cost on her.