Hyderabad: The High Court on Thursday cautioned the state government again-st attempts to “hijack the election process” by conducting polls to municipalities in a hasty manner.
Mr Chinnola Naresh Reddy, counsel for the petitioner, said that government had informed a single judge that it required 149 days to complete the pre-poll process but was now conducting the elections in 30 days. He said that government had completed the pre-poll process within eight days and was going to entrust the process to the State Election Commission.
Expressing concern over government’s speed, Justice Chauhan asked additional advocate general J. Ramachandra Rao, “Has the entire election process been hijacked? If so, people will lose faith in democracy, our country is a role model for the entire world for holding elections in a free and fair manner.”
The CJ asked Mr Rao how much of the pre-election process had been completed, how many objections had been received from voters and how many redressed.
With regard to a previous plea of the State Election Commission before the High Court seeking a direction to the state government to co-ordinate to conduct elections, the Chief Justice said, “For the first time I am seeing the State Election Commission is coming before the court, seeking a mandamus to government. ‘For God’s sake, please tell the Telangana government to hold elections...” it is a frontal attack on the laxity of state government.”
Responding to a query by the bench, Mr Ramachandra Rao replied that government had completed the pre-poll process in advance. Of the 132 municipalities going to the polls, voters in 10 municipalities had raised objections and officials were on the job of redressing them.
The bench then asked, “How can government expect a common citizen to submit his objections to officials within four days and how can the objections be disposed of in a single day? Suppose 500 objections are raised in a single ward. Is it humanly possible for officials to dispose of these objections in a single day?”
Mr G. Vidya Sagar, senior counsel representing the State Election Commission, submitted that it had instructed municipal commissioners to halt further election processes till further orders. It had instructed them to first deal with the objections raised by voters. It had also taken into cognisance the stay orders issued by the court in seven writ petitions. He said that the SEC would not issue the notification for holding elections for municipalities until the objections were resolved and the due process followed in the delimitation of wards. The court recorded the undertaking.
Adjourning the case to July 22, the bench directed state government to inform when it would publish the draft publication of wards, how many objections had been received and how many were redressed.
The court noted that India was a role model for the rest of the world for holding free and fair elections, and suggested that this image should not be tarnished.
A division bench comprising Chief Justice Raghavendra Singh Chauhan and Justice Shameem Akther stated this while hearing a public interest litigation filed by K. Anjukumar Reddy of Nirmal, seeking a stay on the issue of notification for elections in municipalities across the state, alleging that the pre-election process like division and delimitation of wards were illegal and ultra vires to the Telangana Municipalities Act.
