Municipal elections must be held within five months, says Telangana High Court

Source: newindianexpress.com

HYDERABAD: The Telangana High Court on Tuesday directed that the municipal elections be conducted within five months. It gave the State government 119 days to complete the pre-poll exercise of the municipalities and municipal corporations and granted another 27 days to the State Election Commission (SEC) to hold the elections after the government completes its pre-election work.

The court made it clear that the pre-election exercise should commence forthwith and the proposed polls should be held in accordance with the existing municipal laws — Telangana Municipalities Act, 1965 and Telangana Municipal Corporation Act, 1994.

Justice P Naveen Rao passed this interim order on petitions filed separately by the SEC, Telangana State Backward Classes Welfare Association and the Telangana Viswa-brahmana Manmaya Sangham. The SEC filed a petition challenging the inaction of the State in not confirming the delimitation of wards and not notifying the reservation of seats to urban local bodies.

The BC welfare association filed a case complaining that the authorities concerned have not taken steps to conduct polls to three municipal corporations and 53 municipalities whose term expires on July 2.

Viswabrahmana Manmaya Sangham, represented by its president K Ganesh Chary, had sought direction to the authorities concerned not to conduct elections to the urban local bodies without following the pre-election procedure of delimitation of wards, finalising reservations in favour of SCs, STs and BCs as contemplated under Section 8 of the Telangana Municipalities Act, 1965 and so on.

The State govt recently filed its counter affidavit in the case stating that it was committed to conduct elections to urban local bodies and would start the process as early as possible, and for that it requires 151 days to complete the pre-poll exercise for delimitation of wards in ULBs, publication of ward-wise electoral rolls, identification of SC, ST, BC and women voters, reservation of wards, and so on.

After perusing the counter affidavit of the State govt, Justice Naveen Rao asked the govt counsel whether the State would stick to the schedule submitted to the court. In reply, additional advocate general J Ramachandra Rao submitted that the govt needs 151 days to complete the pre-poll exercise for conducting polls to municipalities and municipal corporations. As for allocating reservations to BC, he said govt would proceed with the SC judgment in the K Krishna Murthy’s case. The SEC’s counsel told the court that the commission requires 30 days to conduct polls to ULBs.

State had sought 151 days for pre-poll work

The State had told the court that it needs 151 days to complete the pre-poll exercise for conducting elections to municipalities and municipal corporations. The SEC had sought 30 days to conduct ULB polls.