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| RS poll schedule announced, SC to examine notification | | | EARLY TIMES REPORT
Jammu, Jan 20: The Supreme Court has taken up for hearing a petition filed by Panthers Party leader Bhim Singh challenging the Election Commission decision of issuing separate notifications for election to four Rajya Sabha seats from Jammu and Kashmir.
Meanwhile, the Election Commission today issued schedule for the election process which clearly underlined that there will be three separate notifications for the four seats.
The Supreme Court will examine on Friday the Election Commission’s decision to conduct biennial elections to the Rajya Sabha in three phases for four seats instead of one phase.
The court was hearing a petition alleging that phased elections would benefit the ruling National Conference-Congress combine.
According to an EC notification biennial elections to fill the four seats would be held in three phases in February.
A Bench of Justices B N Aggrawal and G S Singhvi posted the matter for hearing on Friday after the J&K National Panthers Party president and former MLC Bhim Singh who filed the petition mentioned the matter before it on Tuesday.
In his petition Singh submitted that conducting election in different phases would only benefit the ruling Congress and National Conference as elections to the Rajya Sabha are held on the basis of a single transferable vote.
He pointed out that if the elections are held in separate phases, all the four seats would go to the National Conference-Congress combine as the system of single transferable vote would not serve the purpose.
Whereas, if elections were held in a single phase it would enable smaller parties also to win the elections through the system of proportional representation by means of single transferable vote.
He pointed out that in J&K no political party has the strength to secure even one-third of votes on its own.
Thus, holding biennial elections in J&K through three different phases would only benefit the NC-Congress combine which together has 44 MLAs, which is the minimum requirement for a simple majority to elect a single member to the Rajya Sabha, Singh added
Meanwhile, on the expiry of the term of office of the council of States (Rajya Sabha) representing the state of Jammu and Kashmir by S. Tarlok Singh, Prof. Saif-ud-Din Soz, Dr. Farooq Abdullah and Ch. Mohammad Aslam, the Election Commission of India has announced the schedule of Biennial Election to these seats.
According to the Commission, in respect of members of the Council of States to be elected by the Members of Jammu and Kashmir Legislative Assembly, all the four seats are to be filled up on account of biennial retirement of members. On the last occasion, these four vacancies were filled up by holding three separate elections. In accordance with the law on the subject, one biennial election for the seat of S. Tarlok Singh, second biennial election for the seat of Chowdhary Mohammad Aslam and third biennial election for the seats of Prof. Saif-ud-Din Soz and Dr. Farooq Abdullah were held. Consequently, the four members to be elected now shall hold the office for the full tenure of six years. This time also three separate biennial elections will be held to fill up these four seats as was done on the last occasion.
Accordingly, these biennial elections shall be held in accordance with the entailed programme; issue of notification on January 27, 2009 (Tuesday), last date of making nominations February 3, 2009 (Tuesday), scrutiny of nominations February 4, 2009 (Wednesday), last date for withdrawal of candidature February 6, 2009 (Friday), date of poll February 13, 2009(Friday) hours of poll 9 A.M. to 4 P.M, counting of votes February 13, 2009 (Friday) at 5 P.M. besides February 16. 2009 (Monday) will be the date before which election shall be completed. |
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