Chennai: The Madras high court has ordered notice to the Election Commission of India, AIADMK and DMK on a petition, which sought to direct the ECI to reject the nomination of AIADMK candidate V. Senthil Balaji and DMK candidate K.C. Palanisamy for the Aravakurichi re-election, scheduled to be held on November 19, in view of their ‘proved corrupt practices’.
A division bench comprising Chief Justice Sanjay Kishan Kaul and Justice R. Mahadevan also ordered notice to Senthil Balaji and Palanisamy on a PIL filed by voter S. Rajendran of Karur district.
The bench also directed the registry to tag this petition along with connected petitions and posted to November 7, further hearing of the case. According to Rajendran, originally, the ECI issued notification to conduct general election for 235 constituencies on May 16. Even before the election, AIADMK candidate Senthil Balaji and DMK candidate Palanisamy had indulged in various corrupt practices to buy votes for money. Noting the large scale corrupt practices, the income tax department and flying squads had conducted raids and seized several crores of rupees and house hold articles.
The ECI initially postponed the election for the Aravakurichi constituency and subsequently deferred the election. Once the election commission has come to a conclusion that Senthil Balaji and Palanisamy have committed large scale corrupt practices in the election process to purchase the voters from the electors, they should be debarred from participating in the election to be held on November 19.
However, the AIADMK and DMK have decided to project them as their candidates for the reasons best known to them by giving go by to the principle of democracy and clean administration.
The EC cannot act mechanically and it should be alive to the reality, taking into consideration that the two were the root cause for the cancellation of election at huge cost. Therefore, he sent a representation to EC to reject their nomination or debar them from contesting the election. However, there was no response, he added.
PMK announces candidates for bypolls
PMK on Monday announced its candidates for the November 19 polls for Thanjavur and Aravakkurichi and the bypoll for Thirupparankundram.
In a statement here, PMK president G. K. Mani said that party deputy general secretary P.M.K. Baskaran and G. Kunjithapatham will contest in Aravakkurichi and Thanjavur respectively while D. Selvam, also a deputy general secretary, will contest in the Thirupparankundram bypoll. He said the names of candidates were cleared by party founder Dr S Ramadoss and youth wing chief Anbumani Ramadoss.
PMK too has retained the same candidates for Thanjavur and Aravakkurichi it had named for the May 16 state Assembly polls like the AIADMK and DMK. In Aravakkurichi V. Senthil Balaji (AIADMK) and K.C. Palanisamy (DMK), in Thanjavur, M. Rengasamy (AIADMK), and Anjugam Boopathy (DMK) (Thanjavur) are in the fray. In Thirupparankundram, AIADMK’s A.K. Bose and DMK’s P. Saravanan (DMK) are the major contenders. PMK founder Dr S. Ramadoss had strongly criticised both AIADMK and DMK for naming the same candidates in Aravakkurichi and Thanjavur.
