Supreme Court: a voter can personally prosecute a candidate for a false election affidavit, no CrPC bar applies

The Supreme Court has held, settling a previously undecided question, that a private citizen can file a criminal complaint against an elected candidate for furnishing false information in the affidavit accompanying a nomination paper, without routing the complaint through the Election Commission or another public servant. A voter had complained that a sitting Karnataka MLA had given a false residential address in his nomination affidavit, an offence under Section 125-A of the Representation of the People Act, 1951. The Karnataka High Court had quashed the complaint, holding that Section 195(1) of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973, which bars a court from taking cognizance of specified offences against public administration except on a public servant's complaint, applied to Section 125-A as well, so only the Election Commission could prosecute. Justices Dipankar Datta and Sheel Nagu disagreed.

Section 195(1) lists specific Indian Penal Code provisions and does not mention Section 125-A; since Parliament inserted Section 125-A in 2002 and amended Section 195 again in 2006 without adding it, the omission was treated as deliberate. The Court also noted Section 125-A's own clause overriding any other law. It held that a private complaint for an offence under Section 125-A need not satisfy Section 195(1), leaving magistrates free to deal with frivolous complaints using their ordinary powers. The appeal itself was still dismissed, since the false-affidavit charge was not made out on the facts.