In a decision that is bound to put pressure on the State administration that is gearing up for the municipal, Assembly and Lok Sabha elections, the State Election Commission issued a notification here on Monday for the election of Zilla Parishad Territorial Constituency and Mandal Parishad Territorial Constituency members on April 6.
Announcing the election schedule at a media conference here on Monday, State Election Commissioner P. Ramakanth Reddy said that the single phase direct election for 16,589 MPTCs, 1,096 ZPTCs would be held on Sunday, April 6 in the midst of Intermediate examinations and last phase of school annual examinations. The counting would be taken up on April 8 at 8 a.m. and results announced on the same day.
The SEC will use 1.35 lakh ballot boxes for the party-based ZPTC and MPTC elections in 50,907 polling stations for want of adequate number of electronic voting machines (EVMs).
The indirect election of mandal parishad presidents and vice-presidents and zilla parishad chairmen and vice-chairmen would be held on April 13 and 14 respectively.
In the wake of Supreme Court orders on March 7 to issue notification for the much delayed elections to Panchayat Raj institutions by March 10, the SEC sought reservation details from the State government. The latter furnished the details on March 8 night and the Election Commission worked on Sunday to release the schedule on a war-footing to comply with the Apex Court orders, he said.
Squarely blaming the State government for the present situation where back-to-back elections to municipalities, panchayat raj institutions, Assembly and Lok Sabha seats were scheduled, Mr. Ramakanth Reddy said despite several reminders to finalise reservations for municipalities and PR bodies, the State Government did not respond.
Had the government taken a timely decision on finalising reservations for PR institutions after elections to panchayats were completed by July 31, 2013, the present situation would not have come putting severe pressure on the State administration and the political parties, the SEC said.
He also made it clear that the request of the political leaders to postpone municipal elections or at least withhold announcement of election results till the Assembly and Lok Sabha elections were held could not be entertained. Both the Central Election Commission and SEC were constitutional bodies and enjoy equal powers. Even if the Election Commission directed the SEC to postpone municipal elections or its results, the SEC could ignore it.
The commission would only abide by the directive of High Court and Supreme Court, he explained.
