Civic polls: Nomination from Monday

“Several aspiring village panchayat ward members were not given nomination papers on Friday and were asked to come by next week. Those who enquired were told that the matter is pending before the Supreme Court without any further reason,” said Sanjay Gandhi, an aspiring candidate in Orathanadu taluk of Thanjavur district. The nomination process was initially announced to commence on Friday, but no arrangements were made at the district election offices. There are is a lot of uncertainty over the elections to local bodies, the aspirant said.

According to highly placed state official sources, the nomination papers were not issued on Friday as the officials were waiting for the Supreme Court judgment order copy. The DMK members were also not showing much interest as the party is fighting a legal battle pleading for local body elections under single phase.

Meanwhile, the officials from State Election Commission met Chief Secretary K Shanmugham and discussed about the directions given by Supreme Court in conducting local body polls. Rural development Secretary Hansraj Verma and Municipal Administration secretary Harmandar Singh also took part in the high-level meeting. It is also reliably learnt that the DMK legal wing is unhappy with the apex court order and is planning to take up the issue with the Supreme Court’s constitutional bench.

As per the poll schedule of SEC, the direct elections to fill up the total of 1,18,974 posts in rural local bodies is to be held on December 27 and 30. The nominations for the posts were to commence on Friday. This includes 12,524 posts of village panchayat presidents and 99,324 posts of village panchayat ward members.

The election to the posts of village panchayat presidents and village panchayat ward members will be a non-party based polls. The election to the posts of district panchayat ward members and panchayat union ward members will be political party-based one. The Election Commission is yet to announce the poll schedule related to mayors, municipal chairmen and ward councillors.