Paving the way for elections in the Wrestling Federation of India (WFI), the Supreme Court on Tuesday set aside the stay imposed by the Punjab and Haryana High Court on holding of polls to the wrestling body.
A bench of justices Abhay S Oka and Pankaj Mithal said it failed to understand how the entire election process could have been set at naught by high court.
The top court said the proper course by the high court would have been to allow the election to be conducted and make the election subject to the outcome of the pending writ petition.
“Pending a writ petition filed by the Haryana Wrestling Association, by an interim order the high court has stayed the election of WFI. We fail to understand how the entire process of the election could have been set at naught by HC.
“Accordingly, the impugned order granting interim relief is set aside. It will be open for returning officer to proceed with the election by publishing a revised election program. We make it clear that the outcome of the election will be subject to orders that may be passed in the petition,” the bench said.
As the hearing commenced, the bench questioned the high court order staying the election and asked, “How could the election be stayed? Subsequently, it could be challenged. We’ve strong reservations about high court passing an interim order and staying the elections.”
The counsel, appearing for the Haryana Wrestling Association, submitted that Haryana Amateur Wrestling Association’s (HAWA) certificate of affiliation with the Haryana Olympic Association (HOA) was fabricated.
“We say I am the real body. Respondent 5 herein (HAWA) produces a forged letter from the Haryana Olympic Association. On the basis of that forged my objection before returning officer was rejected, and he was made part of the Electoral College. Now, the order of RO is based on the forged letter, I challenged before the high court,” he said.
The top court had earlier sought the response of the Centre and others on a plea by the ad-hoc committee constituted to run the WFI challenging a stay imposed by the Punjab and Haryana High Court on holding elections to the wrestling body.
The ad-hoc panel had moved the apex court against the September 25 order of the high court putting the elections on hold.
The top court had on August 29 refused to interfere with the high court’s order staying the WFI elections.
The development had come days after United World Wrestling, the global governing body for the sport, suspended WFI for not conducting its elections on time.
The Indian Olympic Association-appointed ad-hoc panel governing the WFI had initially scheduled the elections for July 6 but was forced to reschedule it to July 11 after some disaffiliated state bodies from Maharashtra, Haryana, Telangana, Rajasthan and Himachal Pradesh approached it for a hearing, claiming their dismissal was not appropriate.
The panel heard the aggrieved representatives of the state bodies but the polls could not be held even on July 11, with the Gauhati High Court staying the elections after the Assam Wrestling Association sought the right to participate in the poll process.
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