PANAJI: The High Court of Bombay at Goa has told the State Election Commission that there is no need to change the schedule related to election for the village panchayats.
The State Election Commission had approached the High Court and had sought clarification from it if nomination period is to be extended due to stay on reservation in some wards.
It may be noted that the High Court had stayed delimitation and reservations of few wards in 10 village panchayats. Several petitioners had approached the High Court challenging the notification of delimitation and reservations of 15 wards of 10 village panchayats on the ground that due to these delimitation and reservations, their rights to contest elections from their desired panchayats have been violated.
The High Court responding to the state election application said that while deciding the petition of each of the original petitioners no directions have been issued in so far as the applicant is concerned qua the election programme. No separate direction is required in the matter.
The High Court on one of the petition observed that an advocate for the petitioner invited my attention to the impugned notification dated May 16, 2017 on the basis of which three wards were reserved for OBC from the 11 seats with no justifiable reason for such reservation. He had also pointed out to the notification dated April 16, 2012 in respect of the same village panchayat where only one seat was reserved for OBC based on the census of 2011 and urged that there was no basis to reserve three wards for OBC with a total population of 1339 as against the total population of 16,625 persons in the said area based on the census and data issued by the BDO,
Ponda.
