Former councillors are now questioning the State Election Commission (SEC) for not being pro-active to persuade the government and the High Court to conduct the much-delayed civic polls.
The city has been without an elected body for the past three-and-a-half years and the State government is keen to push it beyond the Lok Sabha elections, sources said.
Former city councillors, cutting across party lines, are on the same page and keen on early civic polls and now want the SEC to act decisively.
Abdul Wajid, former councillor from the Congress and a petitioner in the High Court of Karnataka seeking early polls, while maintaining that his party’s government is interested in holding the elections, also said: “We hope that the SEC directs the State government to immediately hold elections to the civic body. In the present scenario delimitation of wards is completed and only reservation is pending. The SEC has all the powers to direct the State to take all necessary arrangements to hold polls at the earliest”.
He added that since the matter was sub judice, the SEC should file an affidavit saying it was prepared to hold the polls and seek directions from the court to the government to complete the reservation matrix at the earliest.
After the Congress government came to power, it withdrew the previous delimitation notification reducing the number of wards from 243 to 225. The Congress government issued new notification in September.
Another former councillor M. Shivaraju, another petitioner, said the SEC still had a window of opportunity to ensure elections in January.
N.R. Ramesh, former BJP councillor, said the SEC did not act immediately after the government notified the new delimited wards and now it was unlikely that the polls can be held before Lok Sabha elections.
“No elections can be held less than six months before the general elections. So that window seems to have closed and now the civic polls will likely be held only after that,” he said.
B. Basavaraju, State Election Commissioner, said that with the delimitation of wards completed, now the advocate representing the SEC will remind the court about the reservation matrix of wards soon.
When asked about filing an affidavit indicating the SEC was ready to hold polls in the city, he said there was no need for such action.
