Karnataka HC sets December 31 deadline to complete BBMP elections

The Karnataka High Court on Friday, September 30, directed the state government and State Election Commission (SEC) to complete the election process for Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) by December 31. It further directed the state government to redo the process of reservation of wards for women and Other Backward Classes (OBCs) categories by November 30. Justice Hemant Chandangoudar issued the directions in response to a number of petitions challenging the draft notification of reservation fixed for 243 wards under various categories. The court also cancelled the government's notification for the reservation of BBMP wards.

The court stated that the decision was being made as the reservation for women and OBCs had been done “randomly”. The court also stated that since the reservation was made as per the population of the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes, there will be no changes in that list. Directing the government to issue notification on reservations by completing the due process by November 30, the court said, "The election process should be completed by December 31.”

With respect to OBC reservations, the court ordered the government to provide accurate OBC population data to the commission that was established to recommend OBC reservations. The government will fix the OBC reservations after receiving updates from the commission. On Wednesday, BBMP released its final list of voters for the impending elections to the civic body. The list includes 79,19,563 voters — 41,14,383 men, 38,03,747 women and 1,433 others.