Delhi court junks plea seeking probe against Sonia Gandhi over electoral roll allegations

The complainant in the case, advocate Vikas Tripathi, had sought the registration of an FIR in the matter.

“The documents clearly indicate that Sonia Gandhi took citizenship of this country… on April 30, 1983. Her name got included in the electoral roll as a voter in the New Delhi constituency in 1980…, which was then deleted in 1982. It re-entered in 1983 when the qualification date was January 1, 1983,” senior advocate Pavan Narang, who represented Tripathi — who is also the Rouse Avenue Courts Bar Association Vice-President — had argued last week.

Tripathi, through Narang, had moved an application under Section 175 (4) of the BNSS (power of any magistrate upon receiving a complaint against a public servant arising in the course of the discharge of his official duties, to order investigation).

“What was the reason for her name getting deleted in 1982? That means something was found by the Election Commission,” the senior advocate, who was accompanied by advocate Himanshu Sethi, had argued on Wednesday before Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate Vaibhav Chaurasia of Rouse Avenue court.

“I think only some documents existed back then… maybe a passport or a ration card. PAN and Aadhaar were not there… What were the documents that were available to her in 1980, which showed that she was a citizen of India?” he had argued.

“To vote, one has to cross the threshold of being an Indian citizen. Being a resident of the New Delhi Parliamentary constituency is the second threshold,” Narang had said.