Chennai: Governor CH Vidyasagar Rao has promulgated two separate ordinances allowing appointment of special officers to local bodies across Tamil Nadu after the Madras high court stayed conduct of panchayat elections.
The ordinances, signed by the acting Governor on October 17, was made public in the form of gazette notification on Wednesday and said the tenure of special officers would end on December 31, 2016.
Two separate ordinances — one for appointing special officers to village panchayats, district panchayats and union panchayats and the other for nominating special officers to town panchayats, municipalities and corporations — were promulgated.
The appointment of special officers to over 1 lakh local bodies arose since their term expires on October 24 after the Madras high court stayed the local body elections early this month. The elections were to be held in two phases on October 17 and 19.
After the promulgation of the ordinance, the special officers would run the day-to-day administration of the local bodies till elected representatives take over after the conduct of fresh elections. This is not the first time that the local bodies would be governed by special officers since no local body elections were held during 1991 to 1996.
The special officers will exercise powers and discharge the functions of the local bodies until the day on which the first meetings of the local bodies are held after ordinary elections or up to December 31, 2016, whichever is earlier, the ordinance said.
