AIADMK moves Madras HC against holding local body polls in 2 phases; questions time gap

The AIADMK moved to Madras High Court against the conduct of the local body polls for nine districts in two phases. The opposition party has expressed its concern over the state election commission's decision of holding the local body elections in two phases and has questioned the long gap between the two phases proposed by the State Election Commission. 

This comes after the Tamil Nadu State Election commission on Sep 13 announced that the rural government polls in the leftover nine districts will be conducted in two phases on October 6 & October 9 and the counting will be done between October 12-16.

AIADMK moves to Madras HC against local polls being conducted in two phases

In the plea filed by the leading opposition party in Madras HC, the AIADMK  has objected to the conduct of the polls in two phases and alleged that how the elections have been announced and the schedule that has been framed itself raises a lot of questions on how the elections would be conducted. 

They further argued that as only nine districts were going to the polls, there is no need for two phases, the elections can be conducted on a single day. 

AIADMK in its plea wrote, “the total polling booths proposed in these nine districts are only 14,573 and there is no logic as to why the elections have to be conducted in two phases. In fact in these elections, there are going to be 22581 Village Panchayat Ward members, 2901 Village Panchayat President, 1381 Panchayat Union ward members and 140 Panchayat District ward members are going to be elected. While the scale of the election is not as massive as it was to cover the entire state, there is no reason for the election to be conducted in two phases.”

The party said that during the recently concluded Assembly elections, even though it was for the entire state, the poll was conducted in a single phase. 

AIADMK also questioned the time gap between the two phases of the election. “The first phase of polling is on 6 October and the 2 phase has been fixed for 9 October with the counting commencing from 12 October and concluding by 16 October. Such long intervals apart from being unwanted also raise a lot of suspicion on the possibility of rigging and such other illegal acts,” the party mentioned in the plea.

The petition also requested Madras HC to order that central government employees shall be appointed as election observers for local elections. It also asked the court that the campaign should be videotaped until the results are announced and the flying squads are established to prevent money laundering and that the Federal Reserve Force be deployed for election work.

Image: PTI