Hyderabad High Court cleared the situation over the votes polled in approval of a successful but dead person and the fate of such elections. It held that such elections are incomplete and needs fresh elections as a dead candidate cannot acknowledge the same.
The HC ruled that the EC cannot declare on its own the elections invalid nor can it declare the dead as winner.
The process of an election would be complete with the election officer giving an election certificate to the successful candidate, and the successful candidate acknowledging in writing the receipt of such a certificate from the election authority.
The bench of Chief Justice Kalyan Jyoti Sengupta and Justice Sanjay Kumar gave this decision while dismissing two pleas that questioned the action of the election commission that had allowed Shobha Nagi Reddy's name to still remain in the ballot paper as a contesting candidate while she died in road accident for Allagadda assembly constituency in Kurnool district in the general elections of April 2014.
