Bombay High Court quashes Election Commission decision to hold byelection for Goa's Ponda

The Bombay High Court at Goa has quashed the Election Commission of India’s (ECI) notification for the conduct of a byelection at Ponda to fill the legislative assembly seat left vacant following the demise of Congress MLA Ravi Naik on October 15, 2025 [Pritam Harmalkar v. Election Commission of India & connected petitions].

A Division Bench of Justices Valmiki Menezes and Amit S. Jamsandekar passed the order on Wednesday, thereby halting the bypolls a day before voting was slated to be held on April 9, Thursday.

The Court set aside the ECI's March 16 notification after noting that any candidate elected to the vacant MLA post would have less than a year in office, which was impermissible under Section 151-A of the Representation of the People Act, 1951 (RP Act).

The current Goa Legislative Assembly’s term runs from March 15, 2022, to March 14, 2027. This leaves about nine months between May 4, 2026 - when the results of the earlier scheduled Ponda byepolls was proposed to be announced - and the expiry of the House.

While so, the Court noted that under a proviso to Section 151-A of the RP Act, the remainder of a newly elected legislative member's term must be computed from the date the new member actually comes into office, not from the date the seat fell vacant. The Court took the date on which the new member comes into office to be the date on which the election results are declared.

The Bench concluded that ECI’s move to press ahead with the byelection would violate Clause (a) of proviso to Section 151A of the RP Act. This proviso says that there is no need to hold bye-elections to fill casual vacancies in legislative assembly seats if the remaining term for any person elected to that seat is less than one year.

Since the ECI's bypoll notification would have enabled the election of a candidate who would only have a nine month term, the Court concluded that the said March 16 notification arbitrary, and contrary to the RP Act. 

“We declare that the notification of March 16 issued by the Election Commission of India is contrary to the provisions of Section 151-A. Considering that the remainder of the period left for the person who might have been elected in the bye-elections to the 21-Ponda Constituency, to represent the Constituency in the Assembly is less than one year, the said Notification is therefore arbitrary, and issued contrary to Clause (a) of proviso to Section 151-A of the Representation of the People's Act. Consequently, we quash and set aside the notification”, the Court held. 

The Court also rebuffed the ECI’s plea to refer the issue to a larger Bench, stressing that all Bombay High Court decisions on Section 151A’s proviso were consistent.

The Bench further refused ECI’s request for a stay on its ruling, despite the ECI pointing out that 171 postal ballots had already been cast and arrangements for polls on April 9 were in place. 

“The consequence of the declaration issued by us that the notification is contrary to Clause (a) of proviso to Section 151-A, must follow since the bye-elections are now declared to be a nullity,” the Court held.

Senior Advocate Akshay Naik and Nitin Sardessai, with advocates Chaitanya Padgaonkar, and Terence Sequeira appeared for the petitioners who challenged the bypoll notification.

Senior advocate SR Rivankar with advocates Rama Rivankar appeared for Election Commission.

Advocate General Devidas Pangam with advocates Deep D Shirodkar appeared for the State of Goa.

[Read order]