The rejection of all eight nominations filed by the members of three trade unions affiliated to opposition parties for the election to the Madurai Housing Society, created tension near the Madurai Regional Office of the Tamil Nadu State Transport Corporation office on the Dindigul Bypass Road here on Monday.
All 11 papers filed by the Anna Thozhir Sanga Peravai (ATP) trade union affiliated to the ruling All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) were accepted.
Transport employees affiliated to the Centre of Indian Trade Unions (CITU), the Indian National Trade Union Congress (INTUC) and the All India Trade Union Congress (AITUC) staged a protest after the rejection of their nominations was announced. While the CITU had filed four, the INTUC and the AITUC filed two nominations each. The unions could not find three women candidates to fight the election.
Consequently, all the 11 candidates of the ATP were elected unopposed to the post of directors of the housing society. G. Rajendran, president of Tamil Nadu Government Transport Employees’ Union affiliated to CITU, said that the Election Officer, Tamil Selvan, had fled his office after rejecting the papers, he said.
The timing for scrutiny of papers was between 4 p.m. and 5.30 p.m. Declaration of the list of nomination papers that were accepted after scrutiny should have been made after 6 p.m. But, the election officer made the final list at around 5.45 p.m. before leaving the office, he alleged.
The CITU State functionary, B. Vikraman, said that the rejection of nominations without giving any proper reason showed that the election was held undemocratically.
The candidates have lodged a complaint with the S.S. Colony police against the election officer for “illegally” rejecting the nominations, he said.
