Chennai : Upholding the ruling Tamilaga Vettri Kazhagam (TVK) MLA R Seenivasa Sethupathi’s one-vote victory from the Tiruppattur Assembly constituency, the Madras High Court has rejected a plea filed by Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) leader KR Periyakaruppan challenging the 2026 Tamil Nadu Assembly election results.
Earlier this year, Sethupathi defeated Periyakaruppan by a margin of just one vote during the Assembly polls. Soon after, the DMK leader filed an election petition to challenge the result. Justice GK Ilanthiraiyan had allowed the application filed by the TVK leader seeking rejection of Periyakaruppan’s election petition at the threshold, Bar and Bench reported.
The Tiruppattur MLA sought rejection of the petition under Order VII Rule 11(a) of the Code of Civil Procedure. He had argued that it did not disclose a cause of action and failed to contain the material facts required under the Representation of the People Act, 1951.
The High Court on September 17 reserved its order on the application.
Notably, Periyakaruppan secured a victory from the Tiruppattur seat in four consecutive elections (2006, 2011, 2016, 2021). However, he was defeated by the TVK leader by one vote earlier this year.
Periyakaruppan’s challenge to the Assembly election results was based on a postal ballot allegedly meant for the Tiruppattur constituency in Sivagangai district, that was mistakenly sent to another Assembly constituency with the same name.
Periyakaruppan contested that rather than forwarding the ballot to the correct constituency, the returning officer, who received it, had decided to reject the same. He claimed that the ballot was cast in his favour and could, therefore, have altered the outcome of the election,
Further, he raised allegations concerning the counting and re-verification of postal ballots. He claimed that a total of 2,276 postal ballots were polled, but only 2,275 were counted, of which 306 were rejected and 1,969 treated as valid.
Moreover, he alleged an 18-vote discrepancy between the round-wise electronic voting machine (EVM) figures and the figures reflected in Form 20 and Election Commission records. Periyakaruppan said that such issues raised disputed questions of fact that required a trial.
