SC refuses to interfere in Rajasthan panchayat polls

The Supreme Court Monday declined to interfere with the schedule of panchayat elections in Rajasthan which were sought to be put on hold following the new provision in which any candidate is required to have a certain level of educational qualification.

Declining to interfere with the election schedule with Tuesday (Jan 6) being the last day for filing the nomination papers, a bench of Chief Justice H.L.Dattu, Justice A.K.Sikri and Justice R.K.Agrawal asked the petitioner, social activist Aruna Roy, to approach the high court to raise their challenge to saddling the contestants with educational qualification.

Besides Roy, other petitioners were the Association for Democratic Reforms and social scientist George Matthew.

The petitioners had also questioned the constitutional validity of the state government ordinance saying that the "literacy requirement prescribed by the impugned ordinance is irrational, arbitrary and violates the constitutional equality guaranteed under article 14 (of the constitution).

The Rajasthan government had Dec 20, 2014, promulgated an ordinance by which a contestant for Zila Parishad or Panchayat Samiti should have passed class 9 and be admitted to class 10 but may not have passed it.

Similarly, the contestant for sarpanch of panchayat in scheduled area or non-scheduled areas should have passed the class five and class 8 respectively.

As senior counsel Anand Grover appearing for Roy urged the court to extend the last date of nominations by another two days as elections tagged with educational qualifications would deprive the very large number of people from contesting the elections, the court asked him to first approach the high court and only then come to the Supreme Court.

"That we can't interfere with (extending the date of nominations by two days). You go to the high court and come back to us," the court said.

The court was told that panchayat elections linked to educational qualification would deprive 82 percent of the rural population from contesting the election and referred to media reports which said that 50 percent of existing elected members of Zila Parishads and 70 percent members of Panchayat Samitis would be disqualified from contesting elections.