BANGALORE: The State Government has withheld the notification for elections to urban local bodies, including town municipal councils, and requested the State Election Commission (SEC) to hold the elections only after the process of delimitation of wards is completed.

The SEC is scheduled to hold elections to 40 urban local bodies made up of five city corporations, nine city municipal councils, 16 town municipal councils and 10 town panchayats.

The decision of the State Government to postpone the elections was communicated on June 17 by the Secretary to the Department of Municipalities and Urban Development Authorities (Urban Development Department) to State Election Commissioner M.R. Hegde.

Highly placed sources in the Government told The Hindu on Wednesday that the decision to withhold the notification was taken soon after the Karnataka High Court allowed a writ petition by Hanumanthappa and others against elections being held to the Sindhanur Town Municipal Council in Raichur district till the wards were delimited according to the 2001 Census.

Court directive

A Division Bench comprising Chief Justice Cyriac Joseph, and Justice N. Kumar had directed the SEC and the authorities (the State Government and the Deputy Commissioner of Raichur district) not to conduct the elections to the Sindhanur Town Municipal Council before determining the number of territorial wards under Section 11 of the Karnataka Municipalities Act.

Several such petitions on elections to other local bodies, including Hubli-Dharwad were filed in the High Court. Though the court confined its verdict to the petition regarding Sindhanur, the Government realised that the court ruling on issues such as the process of delimitation, conduct of elections and the power of the Delimitation Commission would hold good for petitions against elections to other local bodies too. Petitions had been filed against holding elections in Hubli-Dharwad, Gulbarga and Belgaum.

The Government consulted the Advocate-General and the Law Department on the issue before deciding to withhold the notification of May 24 and May 26, 2006, which had set into motion the process of elections to the urban local bodies.

Printer friendly page  
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail