India, June 11 -- The Supreme Court on Thursday refused to halt the ongoing electoral process for the Rajya Sabha elections from Madhya Pradesh, even as it agreed to hear on Friday a plea by Congress leader Meenakshi Natarajan challenging the rejection of her nomination papers.

A bench of justices Prashant Kumar Mishra and Atul S Chandurkar declined to pass any interim order preventing the declaration of the election result, observing that the law laid down by the Supreme Court in 'Election Commission of India vs Ashok Kumar (2000)' was clear that courts should ordinarily refrain from intervening once the electoral process has commenced.

"Sorry, we cannot. We are posting it tomorrow, subject to clearance of all defects," the bench told ...