NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Monday dismissed an appeal filed by Abdullah Azam Khan, son of senior Samajwadi Party leader Azam Khan against the Allahabad High Court's order cancelling his election as an MLA from Suar constituency for being below the minimum 25 years of age at the time of filing his nomination during 2017 UP Assembly polls.
A bench of Justices Ajay Rastogi and B V Nagarathna held that no manifest error was committed by the Allahabad High Court in its judgement of December 16, 2019 as it had examined all oral and documentary evidence on record.
The court pointed out in the instant case, the date of birth of the Khan throughout in his records is January one, 1993.
Only in the year 2015 when the appellant became keen to enter into active politics, his mother of submitted an application for the first time on January 17, 2015, claiming that the appellant was born on September 30, 1990. Within three days, birth certificate was issued by the Nagar Nigam, Lucknow on January 21, 2015.
"No probative value can be attached to the birth certificate issued from the Nagar Nigam, Lucknow," the bench said.
In her separate judgement, Justice Nagarathna said no weight can be placed on the birth certificate, issued by the Nagar Nigam, Lucknow in 2015, on the strength of an entry made in the birth register maintained by the hospital and "is created by manipulation and interpolation in the relevant hospital records."
Justice Nagarathna also concluded that the stand taken by the successful candidate that all documents pertaining to the birth certificate issued on June 28, 2012 by the office of Nagar Palika Parishad, Rampur, were burnt due to a short circuit on May 08, 2015 would suggest that the said birth certificate, wherein the date of birth of the successful candidate was recorded as January one, 1993 came to be destroyed and later cancelled were under suspicious circumstances.
The hospital records were "mired with discrepancies, over-writing and factual inaccuracies and the same cannot be ignored, so no weight can be placed on the birth certificate issued in 2015," she said.
The court also pointed out Khan got passport issued in his name with January 1, 1993 as his date of birth and travelled several countries with it.
It also rejected an ossification test which mentioned his age as 26 years, saying it cannot be accepted as conclusive proof and did not hold much water.
Khan had travelled to many foreign countries on his passports which were obtained in the year 2006 and 2012 and the visa which was granted in the year 2014 and in these documents his date of birth was shown as January one, 1993, the court noted.
"I refuse to believe that an educated individual such as the successful candidate herein, had not, in over nine years (2006 to 2015) looked at the first page of his passport and only later grasped that the date of birth entered therein was ‘incorrect’ only while he was on the verge of entering politics and contesting an election to the Legislative Assembly," Justice Nagarathna said.
Khan was on March 11, 2017 elected from Suar constituency on Samajwadi Party ticket.
Unsuccessful Congress party candidate Nawab Kazim Ali Khan challenged the election on the ground that the winning candidate was not qualified to contest as he was less than 25 years of age as his date of birth was mentioned as on January 1, 1993 in Class X and all other educational certificates.
Khan's father had used his influence to project his date of birth as September 30, 1990. Earlier, a Rampur court had sent Azam Khan and his wife to jail for allegedly obtaining fake birth certificate for their son.
