concerning a public right. Even after a public right has been establised by the judgment of the Court, it may be annulled by subsequent legislation”. 620. It is contended that the election of a candidate is the result of the exercise of their rights of voting by the electorate. An election results from public action and produces a “public right” inasmuch as the electorate and the public become interested parties acquiring the right to be represented by the elected candidate. The right to challenge that election is a statutory right. What the statute gives can be taken away by statute. The grounds for challenging the election could also be altered. No one, it was urged, could be heard to say that he had any vested or inherent right to challenge an election. It was contended that once the applicability of all law previous to the 39th amendment to the class dealt with by Art. 329-A (4) was removed rerospectively, the resulting legislative declaration followed automatically even if it had not been inserted. Its inclusion was a superfluity. Article 329-A (4) was said to be merely incidental and consequential to what was done by earlier clauses (1) to (3). It is difficult to see how Article 329-A (4) which relates to what was past could be incidental or consequential to what was intended to be done in future. Moreover, more serious difficulties, dealt with below, are found here than those which could arise in ordinary cases of retroactive validation. 621. Learned Counsel for the election petitioner relied on Don John Fancis Douglas Liyange v. The Queen. (1967) 1 AC 259 where the Privy Council considered the validity of the Criminal Law Special Amendment Act of 1962, passed by the Parliament of Celon which had purported to legalise ex post factor the detention of persons for having committed offences against the State by widening the class of offences for which trial, without jury but nominated judges could be ordered. The scope of the offence of waging war against the Queen was widened and new powers to deal with offenders were given and additional penalties were prescribed. It was held that although no fundamental principles of justice could be said to have been violated by the Act, yet the Act of 1962 and an amending Act of 1965, were invalid on the ground summarised in the head-note as follows (at p. 260): "That the Acts directed as they were to the trial of particular prisoners charged with particular offences on a particular occasion involved a usurpation and infringement by the legislature of judicial powers inconsistent with the written Constitution of Ceylon, which while not in terms vesting judicial functions in the judiciary manifested an intention to secure in the judiciary a freedom from political legislative and executive control and in effect left untouched the judicial system established by the Charter of Justice 1833. The silence of the Constitution as to the vesting of judicial power was consistent with its remaining where it was an inconsistent with any intention that it should pass to or be shared by the executive or the legislature. The Acts were accordingly ultra virus and void, and the convictions could not stand."