Till the other day, there were attempts to stall the conduct of gram panchayat elections in Andhra Pradesh by moving the high court and then the Supreme Court. Finally, the gram panchayat elections were held successfully.
Now that the state election commissioner Nimmagadda Ramesh Kumar announced schedule for the municipal elections in the state, some people have started trying to stall even the municipal polls.
A petition was filed in the state high court seeking to cancel the schedule for the elections to municipalities and corporations.
The petitioner said the elections have to be held as per the new voters’ list, to enable more people contest the elections.
“Since having a vote in the respective municipality is necessary for a candidate to contest the elections, the old voters’ list will deprive many aspiring candidates an opportunity to contest the polls,” the petitioner argued.
The division bench of the high court, which admitted the petition, took up the hearing. After hearing the arguments of the senior counsels on behalf of the petitioners, the high court deferred the further hearing to Tuesday.
Elections to 12 municipal corporations and 75 municipalities and nagar panchayats would be held on March 10 and counting of votes would be taken up in March 14. The SEC resumed the election process which was stalled in March 2020.
