Delimitation exercise now will delay BBMP polls: SEC to Karnataka High Court

BENGALURU: The State Election Commission on Wednesday submitted before the high court that it has already initiated the process for carrying out the BBMP election. But allowing delimitation of wards at this stage will delay the polls and violate the Supreme Court directions to conduct polls in three months.

The court was hearing an interlocutory application filed by the state government seeking clarification on holding the elections with the existing list of delimitation of wards and reservation list. The court sought to know how long it would take for the government to issue fresh reservation list without carrying out the delimitation process.

The court was informed that there is a discrepancy in the population count of the SC/ST population, which will deny the opportunity for the reserved classes. In the 2001 census, the population of SCs was 8.51 lakh, which had increased to 12.98 lakh in 2011 census, and ST’s population was 86,000 in 2001, which was 1.90 lakh in 2011. The total population of SC/STs in 2001 was 65.37 lakh, which has increased to 96.21 lakh. The bench adjourned the matter to Thursday.

Mega Lok Adalat on Saturday

Acting chief justice S.K. Mukherjee has appealed to the litigants to resolve pending cases in a simplified manner at the national Lok Adalat scheduled to he held on June 13 at various taluk, zilla and state level. The Saturday’s Mega Lok Adalat will focus on Motor vehicle accident claims.

He said on Wednesday that 19,17,802 cases had been settled with per-litigation system in the last three mega lok adalats, helping litigants in getting quick justice and saving money and time.

Justice N.K. Patil, Judge and Executive Chairman, Karnataka Legal Services Authority, said that the state has 64,596 Motor vehicle accident claim cases pending as on May 1 2015.