The government of Tamil Nadu has reiterated its inability to conduct local body elections in the state, this time due to non-availability of district administration due to the ongoing parliamentary polls. Tamil Nadu’s local body elections were due in 2016 and have been delayed for various reasons, including a red alert issued before Cyclone Gaja in November 2018.
In an affidavit filed in the Supreme Court, the government of Tamil Nadu has submitted the reasons for a possible further delay in conducting local body polls.
“The Election Commission has explained the reasons for delay in the notifications of local body elections to the time lost in getting the soft copies of the current Electoral Roll from ECI for handing over to National Informatics Centre and due to non-availability of the district administration machineries as the same is now involved in the electoral process for the Parliamentary elections,” read the affidavit.
'Present status of delimitation'
Providing the present status of the delimitation process, which was the main cause for the delay in conducting the polls, the government of Tamil Nadu stated, “The Delimitation Commission has now submitted its recommendations for reservation of newly delimited wards for Scheduled castes, Scheduled Tribes and Woman based on 2011 Census population for the approval of the government.”
Adding that the recommendations are under active examination of the government and that the same will be notified shortly in the Official Gazette, the affidavit mentioned that the Tamil Nadu State Election Commission has submitted to the Madras High Court that a notification for local body polls will be issued by May 2019.
'Development works not stalled'
Describing that Tamil Nadu has not, in the past, shied away from undertaking its responsibilities as detailed in the Constitution of India, the affidavit stated that the reason for not conducting the polls in 2016 was due to the pressing need for delimitation of wards according to the 2011 census.
Categorically denying the claims that the absence of local body representatives has stalled the development works in rural sectors in Tamil Nadu, the affidavit stated that the government has made alternate arrangements to compensate for the absence.
“In the absence of elected representatives in the rural local bodies at present, by invoking the relevant statutory provisions in the Tamil Nadu Panchayats Act 1994, the government have appointed Block Development Officers as special officers of village panchayats for uninterrupted discharge of civic maintenance responsibilities....,” stated the document. It also added that there was no fund crunch to carry out civic works in the village panchayats as the government had released grants to the local bodies on time.
The local body elections were supposed to take place in October 2016 but were stalled by the Madras High Court after the DMK questioned the manner in which the entire process was carried out. Immediately after that, the state government began ward delimitation works based on the 2011 census. Due to this delay, Tamil Nadu has been functioning without 200 ward councillors and 12,524 panchayat leaders in the state.