{"id":113660,"date":"2021-06-21T10:54:52","date_gmt":"2021-06-21T05:24:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.forumias.com\/?p=113660"},"modified":"2021-06-21T10:54:52","modified_gmt":"2021-06-21T05:24:52","slug":"settling-claims-of-rival-factions-in-a-party-symbol-dispute","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/settling-claims-of-rival-factions-in-a-party-symbol-dispute\/","title":{"rendered":"Settling claims of rival factions in a party symbol dispute"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><strong>Synopsis<\/strong>: How Election Commission decides on party symbol disputes?<\/p>\n<h5><strong>Background<\/strong><\/h5>\n<ul>\n<li>Recently, there has been a split within the Lok Janshakti Party (LJP) and both the factions are claiming for the same party symbol.<\/li>\n<li>In the case of deciding the recognized party among rival factions, the Election Commission of India (ECI) has the final say.<\/li>\n<li>ECI has been empowered with quasi-judicial powers under <strong>section 15 of the Election Symbols (Reservation and Allotment) Order, 1968.<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h5><strong>How Election Commission decides on party symbol disputes?<\/strong><\/h5>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Approach EC: <\/strong>The EC <strong>can not take suo motu cognizance<\/strong> of such cases. It can act only when at least one party approaches it with its claim.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Evidence produced: <\/strong>Once a claim has been raised with EC, it starts the proceedings by giving notice to the other faction to give its version. Both parties are asked to <strong>produce evidence<\/strong> in support of their claim, accompanied by affidavits<\/li>\n<li><strong>Scrutiny by EC<\/strong>: The commission will scrutinize whether, there are rival sections or groups of a recognized political party as claimed based on the information it possesses. If the commission is satisfied that there exist rival factions within a political party then it decides which faction is a recognized party.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Test of majority<\/strong>: The EC employs<strong> \u2018the test of majority\u2019 <\/strong>principle to decide the recognized party<strong>.<\/strong> The EC looks at the strength of each group, in the party\u2019s organization and in the legislatures.\n<ul>\n<li>In case EC is not able to determine the strength of rival groups based on support within the party organization, it resorts to testing the majority among elected MPs and MLAs.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><strong>Binding decision<\/strong>: The decision of the Commission is binding and on all such rivals\u2019 sections or groups.<\/li>\n<li>In 1997 the EC introduced a new rule under which while one faction got the party symbol, the other had to register itself as a separate party.\n<ul>\n<li>The national or state party status of the new formation would be determined only on the basis of its performance in state or central elections after registration.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<table style=\"width: 100%; border-collapse: collapse; background-color: #f7f2f2;\">\n<tbody>\n<tr>\n<td style=\"width: 100%;\"><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><span style=\"color: #333333; text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>Also read<\/strong><\/span><\/span>: <strong><span style=\"color: #3366ff;\"><a style=\"color: #3366ff;\" href=\"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/power-of-election-commission-of-india\/\">Power of Election Commission of India<\/a><\/span><\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<h5><strong>Judicial position on the issue<\/strong><\/h5>\n<ul>\n<li>Many of the cases of split in political parties have landed in the Supreme Court. The most significant case was that of the Indian National Congress (INC) in 1969 where the Supreme Court <strong>upheld the order of the ECI<\/strong> applying the test of majority <em>(Sadiq Ali vs ECI, 1972)<\/em>.<\/li>\n<li>It was a milestone judgment for the Election Commission as the <strong>apex court upheld the constitutional validity of the Election Symbols (Reservation and Allotment) Order, 1968<\/strong>, giving an executive order the status of subordinate legislation.<\/li>\n<li>SC stated that<em> &#8216;The Commission, in resolving this dispute, does not decide as to which group represents the party, but <strong>which group is that party<\/strong>&#8216;<\/em><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>The Supreme Court has, time and again, upheld the test of majority in the Symbols Order to be a \u201cvaluable and relevant test\u201d to decide a dispute between rival groups within a \u201cdemocratic organization\u201d like a recognized political party.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Source<\/strong>: <strong><span style=\"color: #3366ff;\"><a style=\"color: #3366ff;\" href=\"https:\/\/indianexpress.com\/article\/opinion\/columns\/how-are-the-claims-of-rival-factions-in-a-political-party-settled-7365466\/\">Indian Express<\/a><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Synopsis: How Election Commission decides on party symbol disputes? Background Recently, there has been a split within the Lok Janshakti Party (LJP) and both the factions are claiming for the same party symbol. In the case of deciding the recognized party among rival factions, the Election Commission of India (ECI) has the final say. ECI&hellip; <a class=\"more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/settling-claims-of-rival-factions-in-a-party-symbol-dispute\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Settling claims of rival factions in a party symbol dispute<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":61,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1230,9],"tags":[1331],"class_list":["post-113660","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-9-pm-daily-articles","category-public","tag-po_7","entry"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","views":{"total":0,"cached_at":"","cached_date":1701162940},"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/113660","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/61"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=113660"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/113660\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=113660"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=113660"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=113660"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}