“Council elections will be subject to SLPs' outcome”

While paving the way for holding of elections to the proposed Tamil Nadu Legislative Council, the Supreme Court on Monday said that the polls would be subject to the final outcome of special leave petitions against a Madras High Court judgment upholding the September 30, 2010 Presidential notification — Delimitation of Council Constituencies (Tamil Nadu) Order 2010.

Notice issued

A Bench of Justices J.M. Panchal and H.L. Gokhale issued notice to the Centre, Tamil Nadu government and the Election Commission on the SLPs filed by Tidivanam K. Ramamurthee, president of the Nationalist Congress Party, the Bharatiya Janata party and M. Bharathiar questioning the High Court judgment dated December 16, 2010.

When senior counsel Harish Salve, Guru Krishnakumar and Subramonium Prasad wanted stay on elections, Justice Gokhale said: “We can't stay the elections.” The Bench, however, made it clear that any step taken by the government on the delimitation would be subject to the outcome of the petition.

Assailing the High Court judgment, the SLPs stated: “The Constitution, for good reasons, requires placing of the Presidential Order before Parliament so that the delimitation exercise is subjected to Parliamentary scrutiny for any infirmities and accordingly modifications are made. This has been given a complete go-by while purporting to carry out delimitation in Tamil Nadu for the purpose of constituting the Legislative Council.

“Thereby, the High Court has held that there is no need for a specific Parliamentary law and/or placing of the Order before Parliament.

As a consequence, an exercise being carried out contrary to the Constitutional Scheme and in post haste has not been set aside, while giving representation, constituencies ought to be fixed in such a manner as to make the vote equal.”

Erroneous fixation

The SLPs said that the erroneous fixation contrary to the constitutional scheme would be evident from the fact that the value of the vote in Chennai was 21,72,322 whereas in Coimbatore it was 35,77,693, and Dharmapuri, 12,95,182.

Glaring differences

Such glaring differences undermined the very purpose behind the provisions in this regard, particularly, Art. 170 (2) of the Constitution.

“The basis for the electoral rolls is the Census of the year 2001 (almost a decade old) and hence a major chunk of the electorate has been completely left out, which again will negate the purpose of such a Legislative Council since the electoral roll will not reflect the constituency in a genuine and meaningful manner.

“Indeed, it is estimated that a staggering figure of about 46 lakh eligible voters are being left out of the list of eligible voters and indeed out of the entire electoral process.”

The SLPs sought quashing of the impugned judgment and an interim stay of the election process.