Supreme Court permits private complaints over election affidavits in India

India’s Supreme Court ruled that private citizens may file criminal complaints alleging offences over election affidavits, holding that Section 195 of the Code of Criminal Procedure does not bar complaints under Section 125A of the Representation of the People Act.

The decision addresses allegations that elected candidates supplied false information or concealed material facts in affidavits; it does not establish that any particular candidate committed an offence. The court issued the ruling while disposing of an appeal by Rajkumar Madki against a Karnataka High Court order dated March 7, 2025.

The Supreme Court bench comprised Justices Dipankar Datta and Sheel Nagu. The judgment therefore resolved the legal question about access to a private complaint, rather than deciding the truth of an allegation against a specific candidate. The Karnataka High Court had said voters could pursue an election petition instead of bringing a private criminal complaint.

The Supreme Court disagreed with that approach on the Section 195 issue, holding that a complaint alleging an offence under Section 125A need not meet Section 195’s restrictions. Its ruling leaves private citizens able to bring such complaints without that restriction blocking the filing.

Section 195 limits criminal courts’ direct cognisance of certain specified offences unless an authorised public servant or relevant court files a written complaint. The Economic Times describes that general restriction and reports the Supreme Court’s conclusion that Section 125A is not covered by it.

The decision turns on the statute’s omission of Section 125A from Section 195’s restrictions, not on a finding that affidavit allegations are true. The Supreme Court said lawmakers should be presumed aware that Section 125A had been added to the Representation of the People Act four years earlier. It treated the provision’s absence from Section 195 as deliberate.

India Today, The Economic Times and Telangana Today each report this statutory reasoning, while Telangana Today also sets out the High Court’s election-petition alternative. The ruling does not make every complaint sufficient to establish wrongdoing.

The Economic Times reports that magistrates can make appropriate orders when a complaint is frivolous or intended to harass an elected candidate. That safeguard is part of the account of how the complaint route may operate; the sources do not report a particular magistrate’s decision under it.

The immediate legal consequence is that Section 195 cannot, by itself, prevent a private complaint alleging a Section 125A offence over an election affidavit. The next steps in any individual matter would depend on the complaint and proceedings before the competent court. The reports do not describe a specific complaint or candidate whose liability the Supreme Court decided.