Meenakshi's RS nomination rejected: Congress protests 'murder of democracy', seeks legal remedy

In a major blow to the Congress, the nomination papers of Meenakshi Natarajan, close aide of Rahul Gandhi and the party’s candidate for the Rajya Sabha polls from Madhya Pradesh, were rejected during scrutiny on Tuesday (June 9). The Congress said it would seek immediate legal remedy to get the order of the election returning officer revoked. If relief is not granted to Natarajan, the BJP stands to win unopposed all three Rajya Sabha seats scheduled for polls on June 18.

The decision by Arvind Sharma, returning officer for the polls, came after BJP leaders alleged that Natarajan had “concealed information regarding a case pending against her” while filing her nomination papers. Natarajan, who was given an opportunity to respond to the objections, refuted the allegations.

Backlash from Congress

Sources close to the Congress leader told The Federal that Natarajan, after consulting party leaders, including senior advocate Vivek Tankha and the state Congress unit’s legal cell chief JP Dhanopia, informed Sharma that while she had been named as a respondent in a private complaint filed against her by an individual, A Srilatha, in Hyderabad last September, no FIR had been registered in the matter and she had not been made an accused.

Also read: Congress’s MP Rajya Sabha candidate Meenakshi Natarajan’s nomination rejected

The development triggered an immediate backlash from the Congress, which pointed to the “blatant illegality and unconstitutionality” of Sharma’s order and accused the poll panel of acting under instructions from the ruling BJP to “steal the Rajya Sabha seat that the Congress was set to win”.

Tankha, who examined Natarajan’s nomination papers before they were filed, told The Federal, “This is blatantly illegal on two principal counts, among others. First, the returning officer simply cannot reject a nomination in this manner unless an opportunity to correct a deficiency is provided to the candidate and the candidate fails to provide a legally sound response, which is not the case here. Second, this so-called case relates only to a notice served to Meenakshi Natarajan on a private complaint. No FIR has been filed in the matter till date and, forget charges being framed, the court has not even taken cognisance of the complaint. How is this a pending case and where is the criminality?”

Tankha said Sharma’s order acknowledges that Natarajan was only “asked to reply to a summons as a respondent and not as an accused” but omits the fact that “after she filed her response on October 25, 2025, no FIR was subsequently registered”.

High drama at Vidhan Sabha

Sharma’s order triggered high drama at the Vidhan Sabha complex in Bhopal, where scrutiny of nomination papers filed by the four candidates in the fray – the other three being BJP’s Tarun Chugh, Rajneesh Agrawal and Mahesh Kewat – was underway. As Natarajan, along with former chief minister Digvijaya Singh and Leader of Opposition Umang Singhar, arrived at the Vidhan Sabha, a scuffle broke out between Congress and BJP workers.

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At around 6:30 pm, Sharma ruled that Natarajan’s candidature stood rejected on grounds of “filing an incomplete form and concealing facts”.

The rejection came shortly before a majority of Congress's 63 MLAs had boarded a chartered flight bound for Bengaluru. They were forced to beat a hasty retreat. The party had decided to move its legislators out of Madhya Pradesh after the BJP fielded Kewat against Natarajan despite not having sufficient MLAs to ensure his victory.

Kewat’s entry into the contest a day earlier had triggered panic among Congress leaders, who suspected attempts by the BJP to engineer cross-voting by Congress MLAs.

Like the Vidhan Sabha, the Bhopal airport too witnessed chaotic scenes. Congress MLAs arrived shortly after noon but alleged they were first made to wait for several hours because of confusion regarding the flight they were to board and later because the airport had not received the necessary clearance for the chartered aircraft.

Senior Congress MLA from Tikamgarh, Yadvendra Singh, said it was only around 5:30 pm that the clearance arrived and “by 6:30 pm, when news broke about Meenakshi Natarajan’s papers being rejected, the flight had already begun taxying but was turned back”.

Protests outside EC headquarters

If the Vidhan Sabha complex in Bhopal saw loud protests by Congress leaders, the scene outside the Election Commission (EC) headquarters in New Delhi was no different.

Within an hour of Natarajan’s nomination being rejected, a delegation of senior Congress leaders comprising the party’s organisational general secretary KC Venugopal, communications chief Jairam Ramesh, former Chhattisgarh chief minister Bhupesh Baghel, former Rajasthan deputy chief minister Sachin Pilot and former MP Deepa Dasmunsi arrived at the EC headquarters to submit a memorandum objecting to Sharma’s order.

The delegation, however, was not allowed to enter the premises and was told by security personnel to seek a prior appointment.

Videos of Ramesh pleading with security staff to allow entry and later of the entire delegation staging a protest outside the main gate of Nirvachan Sadan quickly went viral. After nearly an hour of protest, Venugopal and Baghel were informed that they could enter and submit the memorandum to the office.

An exasperated Venugopal told reporters: “They rejected the nomination papers of Meenakshi Natarajan and within 30 minutes we sent a letter to the EC seeking an appointment and rushed here to submit a memorandum, but we are not even being allowed to enter. After waiting here for 40 minutes, we were told that two leaders can go in and submit the memorandum to the office, but we need a physical hearing to present and argue our case.”

“This is a clear-cut case of the murder of democracy. If even a small element of democracy remains in this country, the EC must intervene in this matter without delay. If they grant us an appointment tomorrow morning, we are prepared to wait until then; otherwise, we will pursue all available legal options,” he added.

Congress raises objections to Nathwani's nomination

Sources in the Congress told The Federal they did not expect relief from the poll panel but wanted to “at least put the matter on record before the EC”.

“Once a returning officer rejects a nomination paper, there is little scope for an intra-commission review because the Representation of the People Act does not provide for one. The remedy is judicial; you either approach the Supreme Court with an election petition after the election has concluded or move the high court under Section 100(1)(c) of the RP Act challenging the improper rejection of a nomination,” a senior party leader, who is also a leading Supreme Court advocate, told The Federal.

What has left the Congress particularly incensed is that around the same time the BJP raised objections to Natarajan’s nomination papers in Bhopal, the Congress also raised objections over “technical discrepancies” in the nomination papers filed by BJP-backed independent candidate Parimal Nathwani in Ranchi.

However, party leaders pointed to what they described as a stark difference in the manner in which the two cases were handled.

“In the case of Natarajan, the EC acted swiftly to reject her nomination because she is a Congress candidate. In Nathwani’s case, even though scrutiny was scheduled to conclude today (June 9), a decision on our objections has been put on hold by the returning officer in Ranchi because he is being backed by the BJP. This is illegal. Once a schedule has been declared by the EC and a date fixed for scrutiny, even the Chief Election Commissioner cannot interfere with it. Scrutiny can be adjourned only on specific grounds, which clearly do not apply in Nathwani’s case,” Baghel, who is also the Congress observer for the Rajya Sabha polls in Jharkhand, told The Federal.

Party ready for legal battle

Section 36(5) of the RP Act states: “The returning officer shall hold the scrutiny on the date appointed in this behalf under clause (b) of section 30 and shall not allow any adjournment of the proceedings except when such proceedings are interrupted or obstructed by riot or open violence or by causes beyond his control.”

The provision also states that if an objection is raised by the returning officer or by any other person, the candidate concerned may be “given time to rebut it, not later than the second day following the date fixed for scrutiny, and the returning officer shall record a decision on the adjourned date”.

Baghel argued that a decision on Nathwani’s candidature should not have been deferred because he had already furnished his response to the objections and there was no further reason to keep the matter pending.

Nathwani’s entry into the Jharkhand Rajya Sabha contest had triggered fears similar to those raised by Kewat’s candidature in Madhya Pradesh. The ruling coalition in Jharkhand, comprising Chief Minister Hemant Soren’s JMM, the Congress, the RJD and the CPI-MLL, has exactly the number of MLAs required to ensure the victory of JMM’s Baidyanath Ram and Congress’s Pranav Jha on the two Rajya Sabha seats going to polls on June 18.

The BJP and its ally, AJSU, which together have 24 MLAs, are four votes short of the first-preference tally required to ensure Nathwani’s victory. Congress leaders allege that the BJP hopes to bridge this gap by encouraging legislators from the Congress and the JMM to cross-vote in Nathwani’s favour.

The rejection of Natarajan’s nomination has opened a fresh political and legal battle for the Congress at a time when its strength in the Rajya Sabha has been steadily shrinking, the repercussions of which on law-making in the Upper House are highly consequential. While the Congress prepares to challenge the order through legal channels, the immediate effect of Sharma’s decision is to place the BJP within striking distance of securing all three Rajya Sabha seats from Madhya Pradesh without a contest, and, move a trifle closer to that two-thirds majority mark that the saffron party has been aching to get to since 2014.