CHENNAI: The Supreme Court on Monday reacted sharply to a plea to grant the Tamil Nadu State Election Commission (SEC) seven months to complete the elections to urban local bodies in the State. Following this, senior counsel for the SEC Mukul Rohatgi requested for at least three to four months.When Rohatgi sought seven months to complete the elections, the bench headed by Chief Justice NV Ramana said, “The government can do anything it wants to do. But whenever the issue of local bodies elections come up, they say, no, no.”
Responding, Rohatgi explained that the State government’s workforce was busy with the Assembly elections in February and March, and later, with Covid-related work. As such, the court should grant at least three to four months to complete the elections in urban local bodies, he said. P Wilson, the counsel for the petitioner S Shankar, who filed a PIL on conducting the local body polls, told the court the petitioner has no objection in granting time. Following this, the bench directed Shankar to file his response to the SEC’s plea within two days.
Meanwhile, responding to reporters’ queries in Salem, Municipal Administration Minister KN Nehru indicated that the preliminary work for conducting elections to urban local bodies in the State might take about five months.The minister said the preliminary work would take up to 20 days, after which the general public would be given 100 days to raise objections.
"The government recently created six new municipal corporations and 28 municipalities. Communal rotation has to be changed for these newly created urban local bodies. We will finish the work in the next 15 to 20 days. After that, we have to give 100 days for the general public to raise objections in the delimitation of wards and communal rotation," KN Nehru said. Besides, 30 more days would be required to publish the final list, he added.