Madhya Pradesh Panchayat Polls Stayed After Ruling Over OBC Reservation

Bhopal: The panchayat elections in Madhya Pradesh, scheduled in three phases during January-February next year, have been cancelled by the State Election Commission, a move coming after the Supreme Court ruling on OBC reservation.

The Madhya Pradesh government had three days ago withdrawn the ordinance it had passed to hold panchayat polls in the state. The state assembly had on December 23 passed a resolution against holding panchayat elections without OBC reservation.

The state election body arrived at the decision to scrap the entire panchayat poll process after taking legal opinion.

BS Jamod, secretary, State Election Commission (SEC) said the security money deposited by those who have already filed nominations for the initial phase of the elections, will be returned.

On December 4, the SEC had notified the holding of polls in three phases for 859 posts of district panchayats across 52 districts, 6,727 posts under 313 janpad panchayats, sarpanchs of 22,581 village panchayats and 3,62,754 posts of village panchayats members.

However, on December 17, the Supreme Court stayed the poll process on the seats reserved for OBCs in the panchayat elections in Madhya Pradesh and re-notified these seats as general category seats.

Following the Supreme Court’s orders, the SEC decided to postpone the tabulation of votes and declaration of results of the panchayat polls.

With OBCs forming over 50 per cent of the state’s population, the staying of the poll process on OBC reserved seats has triggered a major political controversy with the ruling BJP and opposition Congress blaming each other for the crisis.