Chennai: The opposition DMK on Sunday condemned the State Election Commission (SEC)’s latest notification issued on Saturday for holding polls to rural local bodies in Tamil Nadu in two phases on December 27 and 30 and endorsed its leader M K Stalin’s view to again move the Supreme Court on the issue.
A high-level meeting of DMK MPs’, MLAs’ and district secretaries here, chaired by Mr. Stalin, in a detailed resolution on the local bodies’ elections, came down heavily on both the AIADMK government and the SEC for allegedly “acting in concert to somehow conduct the polls, disregarding the directives of the Supreme Court.”
Pointing out that the Apex court’s ‘historic verdict’ on December 6 had clearly said that SEC could hold the elections to rural local bodies in the State barring the nine districts that emerged from recent bifurcations of already existing districts, the DMK resolution emphasized that the Apex court had said that holding the elections in other districts had to be after “fully completing” the process of delimitation of wards and reservation of seats for women/ST/denotified communities.
The Supreme court also made clear that without the delimitation of wards completed, polls could not be held in the new nine districts as enjoined by the Constitution and that it upheld the DMK’s contention for “proper conduct” of the elections after “fulfilling all the requirements” at the earliest under the Panchayati Raj and Nagarpalika Acts, the DMK resolution said.
While the Tamil Nadu government’s counsel in the Apex court had agreed to “abide” by all its directives before issuing any fresh notification for the local bodies elections to ensure free and fair polls and in a democratic manner, the DMK meeting said it welcomed the Supreme Court’s orders as “historic”. It was a victory for the DMK’s prolonged legal battle for over three years now for proper conduct of the polls after fulfilling all constitutional requirements, it stressed.
However, disregarding the directives of the Apex Court, the DMK resolution said the SEC had now issued a fresh notification, allegedly in haste and in a bid to help the ruling AIADMK. Hence, the party said it fully endorsed Mr. Stalin’s position that there was no other option but to again approach the Supreme court.
The AIADMK not only created new districts, which led to a fresh impasse, but also passed an ordinance for ‘indirect elections’ to Mayors and chairpersons of urban local bodies, though historically, elections to all the local bodies were held in one phase only. The ruling party’s decisions only ‘complicated’ the electoral process, the DMK charged.
Charging the ruling AIADMK for not holding the local bodies elections, due in October 2016 itself, for more than three years now, by adducing ‘one excuse after another’ in the courts at various stages, the DMK resolution alleged that on top of it the ruling party was carrying on a “false, vicious propaganda” that it was the DMK which was stalling the polls.
Nothing could be farther from the truth, as borne out by the latest Supreme court order, which clearly mentioned that the DMK was not against holding the elections, the resolution said an reiterated that the party was “ready to face the elections whenever they were held.”
