BENGALURU: After prolonging the elections to the local body in the state capital for more than five years, citing multiple reasons, smaller political parties doubt if the elections will be held before June 30 as per the Supreme Court order.
It was in August 2015, Bengalureans exercised their franchise and elected their corporators for the erstwhile Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) with 198 wards, which is now transformed into Greater Bengaluru Authority (GBA) with 369 wards, spread across five city corporations.
According to the timeline shared by the State Election Commission to the SC, the final notification of the ward reservations will be out by February 20. Then the commission will take up works related to the survey of voters, shifting them among the wards as per the delimitation and other works. After completing all these works, the commission will publish the final voters’ list on March 16, and the polls are planned for May, said a source privy to the development. He said that by all chances, elections, if not for any hurdles, will be held by mid-June.
AAP chairman, Bengaluru East, Ashok Mruthyunjaya said that there are multiple hurdles to the GBA elections. “There is an ongoing case in the High Court of Karnataka, questioning the very formation of GBA, citing that it is unconstitutional, going against the 74th Amendment.
The order is due for hearing in March and it will have a direct impact on holding elections. Also, the already published draft reservation to the 369 wards, government has not followed the ‘triple test criteria’ (three tasks for finalisation of reservation to OBCs in the local bodies) and caste federations are gearing up to drag the government to the court.”
Mruthyunjaya alleged that just to keep on postponing the elections, it would not be a wonder if any of the Congress political party leaders themselves go to court against the government’s reservation.
Srikanth Narasimhan, founder and general secretary of Bengaluru Navanirmana Party (BNP), which is one of the petitioners in the SC case on the elections, said that the party hopes that the court will be able to hold the government and State Election Commission accountable to at least this deadline. “The government has not shown any inclination in the last five years to conduct the election, and it is now up to the court to ensure compliance.”