Thiruvananthapuram: Kerala Election Commissioner has decided to approach the Supreme Court regarding the upcoming local body elections. This move by EC came when Kerala HC Divison bench gave the decision to the conduct the poll elections on the basis of 2019 voter list used for the Lok Sabha polls and not according to 2015 local polls.
State's Election Commissioner V Bhaskaran State Election Commissioner said that they will inform the Supreme Court the practical difficulties in conducting the polls based on the 2019 voters list.
Read: Coronavirus: 406 people from ITBP camps to go home soon
In the wake of the verdict, the process of updating the voter list has been stopped. If the 2019 electoral roll was used, door-to-door visits will have to be carried out to prepare a ward-based roll. Bhaskaran said that an additional 10 crores would be needed to recast the 2019 voters' list so as to make it ready for the upcoming local body polls.
The Bench passed the verdict while allowing appeals filed by Congress leader N. Venugopal and Indian Union of Muslim League (IUML) Nadapuram Mandalam president Soopy Narikkatteri against a single judge’s judgment upholding the decision of SEC. The single judge had upheld the decision while dismissing their pleas against the decision.
Read: Pak violates ceasefire in J-K's Hiranagar
The petitioners pointed out that the electoral rolls were renewed for the Assembly election of 2016 and finally for the 2019 Lok Sabha election. If the 2015 electoral rolls were taken as draft rolls, it would inconvenience a large number of voters as they would have to again enrol their names in the list.
