Govt to ensure no one contests panchayat poll on party symbol

Ruchika M Khanna

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, August 9

The AAP government is all set to amend the Punjab Panchayat Election Rules, 1994, to ensure that no one can contest the poll on the party symbol.

Highly placed sources told The Tribune that the amendment to Section 12 of these Rules had been approved by the Rural Development and Panchayats Department and would now be presented before the Cabinet for its final approval.

Recently, a discussion on bringing this amendment was held between officers of the department, the State Election Commission and representatives of the Advocate General office.

Once approved by the Cabinet, the amended Rules would be tabled in monsoon session of the Vidhan Sabha in early September.

The government wants to end factionalism, which create roadblocks in the development works being carried uniformly in villages.

Though the panchayat elections in Punjab are not contested on the party symbol, candidates in the fray can tell the State Election Commission that they belong to a particular political outfit and like to have the party symbol allocated to them.

Elections to the 13,241 panchayats are expected to be announced any time now.

Sources in the government indicated that these could be held before September end, almost coinciding with the bypoll to four Assembly segments of Dera Baba Nanak, Chabbewal, Barnala and Gidderbaha. The bypoll has been necessitated after the MLAs of these constituencies were elected to the Lok Sabha in June. Sources said the government was mulling direct elections of panches wherein top five candidates in terms of votes polled would be elected. However, there’s a legal lacunae, including implementation of reservation of seats.

In 2008, the elections were indirect (elected panches picked the sarpanch), but in subsequent two panchayat elections, the sarpanches have been elected directly by the voters.