KOCHI: The Kerala High Court on Friday said that there was a flaw in the recounting procedures in the union elections of Thrissur Kerala Varma College. The court made the remark while considering the petition filed by KSU candidate Sreekuttan demanding the cancellation of the chairman election.

After examining the tabulation records, the court asked how votes which were found invalid during the first count were considered valid during the recounting. The court, which held that only valid votes should be taken into account in recounting, expressed doubt about whether there were flaws in the procedures. The court said that if invalid votes are found, these should be set aside and kept separately. When the votes were first counted, the KSU candidate got 896 votes and the SFI candidate got 895 votes, the court added.

According to the court, no reason was clearly mentioned in the complaint filed by the SFI candidate seeking recounting. The complaint only stated there was confusion regarding the counting. The university has taken the stand that if there is a complaint about the election, the complainant should approach the vice chancellor and not the court. The petitioner's contention is that SFI won the election by treating the invalid votes as valid during the recounting. The petitioner, who pointed out that this was against the guidelines, demanded that the election should be re-conducted.