The Andhra Pradesh High Court on Monday suspended the election schedule issued by the State Election Commission for the Gram Panchayats.
The court, which heard the case moved by the State government and impleaded by the employees’ associations, felt that the schedule would disturb the covid vaccination.
The court upheld the public health on priority besides upholding the contention of the employees’ associations.
Advocate General S Sriram, who argued for the state government, complained against the pre-determined and motivated decisions of the state election commission.
He said that the State government had represented its case on January 8 evening through the chief secretary, and secretaries of health and panchayat raj departments.
The chief secretary had requested the state election commissioner to defer the decision as the government machinery was busy with the covid vaccination schedule to be issued by the central government.
However, within two hours after the meeting, the state election commission had issued a detailed note and schedule, which gives scope for the people to suspect that the schedule was ready even before the chief secretary met the state election commissioner.
The detailed schedule also excluded the MPTC and ZPTC elections, which were postponed in March 2020 along with the Gram Panchayat elections.
The court also heard the arguments of the counsel for the employees’ associations and justified the fears expressed by the government employees.
The court was further informed that the state government including chief minister Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy was busy with a video conference with Prime Minister Narendra Modi even on Monday.
The Central government is preparing a schedule for the covid vaccination and the court felt that the election schedule at this stage would disturb the vaccine schedule.
