VIJAYAWADA: The Andhra Pradesh High Court on Thursday reserved its verdict on a petition filed by the YSR Congress Party (YSRCP) seeking directions to the State Election Commission (SEC) to conduct local body elections only after completion of the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls and publication of the final voter list.
A division bench comprising Chief Justice Lisa Gill and Justice Challa Gunaranjan reserved the verdict after hearing arguments from the YSRCP, SEC and the State government. The petition had raised concerns over holding local elections on the Assembly electoral rolls with January 1, 2026, as the qualifying date.
Senior counsel Subramanya Sriram, appearing for the YSRCP, said the party was not seeking postponement of the elections but wanted them to be held on the basis of the final electoral rolls published after the SIR. He contended that proceeding with the existing rolls could result in eligible voters being excluded. He also said that incorporating all changes made up to last date for nominations through a supplementary roll would be acceptable.
Sriram claimed that the draft rolls prepared during the SIR contained names of around 15.22 lakh deceased persons, 7.37 lakh allegedly duplicate voters and a large number of persons who had permanently migrated.
He argued that using January 1, 2026, as the qualifying date was arbitrary and could result in different voter lists being effectively used for Assembly and local elections. SEC counsel Ashwani Kumar submitted that the Commission proposed to conduct the elections using the electoral roll available as of January 1, 2026.
