HYDERABAD: The Telangana High Court has directed the State government to file separate counter affidavits informing about the action taken by it in each of the petitions wherein the Court has earlier granted stay on conducting the election to about 77 municipalities (out of a total 128) in the State.
The petitioners have alleged irregularities in respect of ward delimitation, the publication of electoral rolls, finalisation of reservations and so on during the pre-poll exercise taken up in their respective municipalities.
When these matters came up for hearing before Justice A Rajasheker Reddy on Friday, additional advocate general J Ramachandra Rao told the court that the government has already filed a common counter affidavit in batch petitions with a plea to dismiss them since there are no merits in batch cases.
On the other hand, the counsels appearing for the petitioners contended that their objections have not been cleared and that the delimitation of wards was not done in accordance with the provisions of Telangana Municipal Rules.
Besides, there were discrepancies in the voters’ list and the public representatives were not put on notice while identification of voters belonging to SC, ST, BC and women community.
The State has not filed counter affidavit in each of these cases, they pointed out. The matter has been posted to Tuesday for further hearing.