TS: Panchayat elections to be held from Jan 21

Telangana State Election Commission on Tuesday announced the dates for Gram Panchayat elections. They will be conducted in three phases on January 21, 25 and 30. With this announcement, the model code of conduct (MCC) comes into force. State Election Commissioner V Nagi Reddy announced the poll schedule and said that around 19 Gram Panachayats, out of the total 12,751 Gram Panchayats, would not go to polls. Elections in these 19 villages were held after 2013 July, he said.

The officials have prepared 3.5 crore ballot papers for the elections. The voters will caste two votes, one for the Gram Sarpanch and another for the ward member. The counting will take place immediately after the polling ends on January 30. The ward members will then elect an Upa-Sarpanch. 

The deposit amount for the Sarpanch (general) will be Rs 2,000 — for the SC, ST and BC candidates it will be Rs 1,000. For ward members, the deposit amount will be Rs 500 (general) and Rs 250 (for reserved candidates).

The poll expenditure cannot exceed Rs 2.5 lakh and if the village’s population is more than 5,000. This amount is Rs 1.50 lakh if the village’s population is less than 5,000. For the ward members, the poll expenditure cannot exceed Rs 50,000 and Rs 30,000 respectively.

Petition filed challenging Panchayat Raj Ordinance

A petition was moved before the Telangana HC on Tuesday, challenging the Ordinance issued by the government amending the Telangana Panchayat Raj Act, 2018 to implement a cap of 50 percent reservations in the upcoming Panchayat elections. The petitioners claimed that the Ordinance was issued without taking to consideration the economic and statistical data of BCs in the State. The matter will  be taken up on Wednesday.

Meanwhile, Congress party too said that it would explore legal options to prevent the elections from being held as the BC quota issue had not been resolved yet. TPCC treasurer Gudur Narayana Reddy said that they State government had done injustice by BCs in the State by ‘reducing’ their reservations.