HC extends stay on poll process by a day

Kolkata: The Calcutta High Court on Tuesday further extended its stay on the Panchayat poll process by another day.

A single-judge bench of Justice Subrata Talukdar will hear the arguments by both the parties again in the first half on Wednesday.

Justice Talukdar on Monday had extended the original stay on the election process till April 16 by one day till Tuesday, in view of an appeal filed before a division bench of the court against the stay.

On Tuesday, Trinamool counsel Kalyan Banerjee, arguing about the maintainability of the petitions filed by BJP and CPI-M accusing the ruling party of pre-poll violence in the state, said that under Article 243(3) of the Indian Constitution, the court cannot interfere after the poll process has kicked off.

Banerjee pleaded that the election process is getting delayed and urged Justice Talukdar to lift the stay. He also cited a judgment of 2000, between one Ashok Kumar and the Election Commission, in this regard.

Justice Talukdar said that the court had to interfere after the state Election Commission (SEC) extended the date of filing nominations by a day, but revoked it in less than 24 hours.

Banerjee also questioned the intention of BJP, citing that they have filed 38,185 nominations, but are still alleging that they had been prevented from doing so.

Interestingly, during the hearing on Tuesday, Justice Talukdar said on a lighter note that it seems that the matter will not end at this bench.

Taking the cue from his statement, Banerjee said that he had also thought on the same lines.

According to legal experts, the discussion is a clear indication that the Panchayat poll matter will go to the Supreme Court.