Chennai: The Madras high court has adjourned petitions and appeals related to the local body polls to July 14 as a petition in connection with this would come up for hearing before the Supreme Court on July 12.
When a petition filed by A. Narayanan, of Change of India, an NGO, came up for hearing before the first bench comprising Chief Justice Indira Banerjee and Justice M. Sundar, advocate general Muthukumaraswamy submitted that the SLP with regard to the conduct of local body elections filed by DMK would come up for hearing on July 12.
In the petition, Narayanan has challenged the constitutional validity of extending the tenure of special officers for local bodies.
Senior advocate P. Wilson, appearing on behalf of DMK, submitted that there is no bar on high court to hear the matter before it.
Senior counsel B. Kumar, appeared on behalf of the State Election Commission, has submitted that as per the order passed by single judge, the amendments have to be implemented by the state government to prevent the candidates with criminal background from contesting in the elections and also with regard to reservations for SC and ST's in the local bodies.
The bench has allowed impleading petition from advocate M. Palanimuthu, who sought for a direction to the Tamil Nadu government to finalise a decision for
reserving constituencies in all local body standing committees to Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes or women before the announcement of Tamil Nadu local body election.
