Can’t stop civic polls over small issues: Telangana high court

Hyderabad: Stating that the swapping of voter names from one ward to another was not an issue big enough to stop the municipal elections for months together, the Telangana High Court on Monday opined that the polls should go on. It cannot be stopped on the basis of such a minor issue which can be rectified in one or two days.

The division bench comprising Chief Justice Raghavendra Singh Chauhan and Justice A. Abhishek Reddy was dealing with the PILs filed by Mr K. Anju Kumar Reddy from Nirmal and another by Mr Malla Reddy, an agriculturist from Malkajgiri, who alleged that the state government and municipal authorities had violated the Municipal Act in completing the pre- poll process for the urban local body elections and sought a stay on the issue of election notifications.     

After perusing the affidavit furnished by the government, which stated that all pre-poll processes had been conducted according to the rules, the bench observed that the elections should go on. The batch of PILs seeking a stay on holding the elections are pending since July and it is high time elections should be conducted in the state, it averred.

Advocate Naresh Reddy Chinnola, counsel for the petitioner, submitted that five MPs had filed their affidavits before the court, that they were not informed or municipal authorities have not put them on notice regarding the finalisation of the delimitation of the wards in their constituencies.

Mr Chinnola said that it was compulsory to inform the public representatives about the division of wards, under Rule 7 of the Municipal Act. He brought to the notice of the court the fact that that a single judge of the High Court had granted stay orders on holding municipal elections in 70 municipalities, which depicts the grave violation of rules.

The bench told the petitioners to not magnify small issues which can be rectified in a short time and said that the names of the voters might have been swapped into other wards but would have not gone in the lists of other districts.

At one stage, the court was about to direct the state to ascertain information as to how many days it would take to hold elections and the time schedule from the State Election Commi-ssion. But the insistence by the counsel for the petitioner on the violation of the rules made the court adjourned the hearing on the PILs to Wednesday.