Bathinda, June 26
The Punjab Government may postpone the panchayat elections — slated to be held on June 29 — by a week or so following the detection of a number of flaws in the election process.
Though a final decision in this connection will be taken at high-level meeting to be held in Chandigarh tomorrow, a section of District Election Officers of Punjab has started approaching the state Chief Secretary and the State Election Commissioner to solve various problems being faced by it due to flaws in the election process. The meeting will be either presided over by the Chief Secretary or Secretary, Rural Development and Panchayat, Punjab.
Information gathered by TNS revealed that a section of higher officials of the state were at a total loss when they were made aware of various flaws in the election process. Even they failed to guide the field staff on how to deal with the situation.
Official sources said that flaws in the election process, including nomination papers, were detected following new instructions were issued by the Additional Director, Rural Development and Panchayat, to the field staff today. In the instructions issued by the Additional Director, it was mentioned that all those connected with the election process should follow the decision of the Punjab and Haryana High Court given in the Asha Rani vs State of Punjab on July 16, 2001, in connection with the fact that once a person filed nomination in the reserved category he could not claim to be treated against the general seats.
Earlier, the Department of Rural Development and Panchayat had instructed the field staff that if any Scheduled Caste
candidate got more votes than the candidate of the general category in the same constituency, he or she would be treated as elected from the general category seat and the second Scheduled Caste candidate, who would get less votes than the first Scheduled Caste candidate, would be treated as elected from the Scheduled Caste category seat.
Official sources said that after the new instructions were issued, all ballot papers which were got printed by the District Election Officers, had become infructuous as these were printed according to the earlier instructions. To implement the new instructions, new ballot papers were needed.
Besides the nomination papers, which had been filled by the contestants, had no column for the candidates belonging to the backward castes and general category women. In the nomination papers, the only column which was mentioned was concerning the category of the nominee.
Mr Anurag Aggarwal, Deputy Commissioner-cum-District Election Officer, Bathinda, when contacted, while refusing to disclose anything, said that he had taken up the matter with the higher authorities.
However, a senior official of the Rural Development and Panchayat Department pointed out that if the state government did not remove the flaws, it would witness huge litigation regarding the panchayat elections.
Mr J.R. Kundal, Secretary, Department of Rural Development and Panchayat, Punjab, could not be contacted despite repeated efforts.
