Tamil Nadu State Election Commission has, on Saturday, upheld its previous announcement of the local body elections where the rural bodies of the state, except nine districts, will go for elections in two phases on December 27th and December 30th while the polls have been halted in the nine districts until the delimitation of wards and reservation of electoral seats are completed.

The announcement from the State Election Commission comes a day after the Supreme court has directed the commission to conduct the local body elections across the state except for the nine districts which include five new districts mapped by the state government recently. While the dates of the election in the rural bodies remain unchanged, the commission has proposed new dates for the nominations and as per Saturday's announcement, the nominations for the rural local body polls in 27 districts of the state will begin on December 9th and the nominations will be closed on December 16th after which the election commission will scrutinize the nominations on December 17th before finalizing the names of the candidates.

The counting of the votes will take place on January 2nd, 2020 during which the results would be declared on naming the representatives of the local bodies that have been left vacant for the past three years. The Supreme court has, on Friday, directed the Tamil Nadu State Election Commission (SEC) to conduct the local body elections across the state except for the nine districts Kallakurichi, Tenkasi, Chengalpattu, Kancheepuram, Tirupattur, Ranipet, Villupuram, Tirunelveli, and Vellore by citing the pending delimitation of wards.

The verdict of the Apex court was pronounced on Friday after the apex court bench heard the petition filed by the state's opposition party DMK where the party had sought a directive from the Supreme court on postponing the local body elections till the finalization and completion of the delimitation of the wards and the reservation of the electoral seats in the nine districts. Through its petition, DMK has underlined that the people of these districts would be left with baffles and confusion regarding their wards as the state government has recently created new districts.

By directing the commission on Friday to conduct the local body polls across the state except for the nine districts and the court has awarded the State Election Commission with four months' time to complete the delimitation of wards and reservation of seats in the nine districts and to conduct the polls. Recently, the state government of Tamil Nadu had created five new districts from four big districts - Kallakurichi from Villupuram, Tenkasi from Tirunelveli, Chengalpattu from Kancheepuram and Tirupattur, Ranipet from Vellore and the delimitation of the wards in these nine districts had not been conducted so far.

Also read: https://thenewstuff.in/local-body-elections-supreme-court-directs-sec-conduct-polls