Reservations for GP polls as per new Panchayat Raj Act

All eyes are on the reserved seats of the Gram panchayat elections as the government would submit seat-wise reservations details to the State Election Commission on Monday.

This would be the final act of the government as far as preparing for the elections and the State Election Commission would take over the rest of the electoral activity.

Panchayat Raj Minister Jupally Krishna Rao informed a week ago that the government would submit the details of the seat-wise reservations of the GPs to the SEC by June 25. He said that the reservations have been done on the basis of the new Panchayat Raj Act.

According to sources, 34 per cent of the sarpanch and ward member seats have been reserved for the BCs, 20 per cent for the SCs and six per cent for the STs.

As many as 580 sarpanch seats have been reserved for the STs, 2070 for the SCs and 3440 for the BCs out of the total 12,751 GPs.In villages and tribal hamlets where only STs live, the sarpanch and ward member posts have been reserved for them. The women would be provided 50 per cent of these reserved seats.

As the state level determination of reservations is completed, the Panchayat Raj officials have taken up district and mandal-wise reservation process as per the ratios fixed by the government.    

They would decide which village should be given to the reserved category and the one to the general quota. However, the political parties and aspirants of sarpanch posts are eager to know the reservation status of the sarpanch and ward member posts.

In a village unless they know the reservation status, the leaders could not decide whether to contest or not. If the seat is reserved to the community they represent, then they would have the opportunity to contest.

As far as the political parties are concerned, official information about the reserved seats is essential to select nominees for the sarpanch and ward member posts. As soon as they come to know about the reserved seats, the leaders would pick up party supporters from that particular section.

The government may also clear the dates of the GP polls in this week. It would examine the schedule being prepared by the SEC and would give its nod. The SEC wants to complete the election process by end of July.

It has already completed identification of polling stations, procurement of ballot boxes, identification of critical areas, required number of poll staff and publication of voter lists ward wise.