Cong seeks disqualification of AAP RS nominee for holding office of profit

The ruling AAP, however, rubbished Maken's allegations, saying he was raising the "frivolous objections" to gain "cheap publicity".

In his objection filed with the retuning officer, Maken claimed that Gupta is "currently holding the office of a Trustee of the National Pension System (NPS) Trust. He was appointed on March 30".

Gupta, along with two other Rajya Sabha candidates of the Aam Aadmi Party, Sanjay Singh and Sushil Gupta, had filed nomination papers on January 4. The scrutiny of the nominations is on Saturday.

"ND Gupta's nomination is liable to be rejected under Section 36 of Representation of Peoples Act, 1951 read with Article 102 of the Constitution," Maken claimed.

Meanwhile, in a tweet on his official Twitter handle, AAP leader Raghav Chadha said that Maken was trying to gain "cheap publicity" through "frivolous" objections as the law does not forbid trustees from contesting.

"Section 3, clause (L) of Parliament (Prevention of Disqualification) Act, 1959, gives exemption to trustee from disqualification under office of profit. Also, RO (returning officer) is not competent authority to adjudicate on OoP, EC is. Frivolous objections to gain cheap publicity by Congress," Chadha said.

In his next tweet, Chadha added that Gupta had resigned from his post in the NPS Trust on December 29 last year.