Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU, Mar 25: The State Government proposed to hold Panchayat elections in the month of May and, for the purpose, the State Election Commission today crossed the last hurdle by putting draft electoral rolls in public domain and announcing that final rolls will be published on April 15.
Official sources told the Excelsior that the process to hold Panchayat elections has been set in motion with the completion of process for delimitation of Panchayat constituencies and publication of draft electoral rolls today. With April 15 fixed as final date for publication of electoral rolls, the Panchayat elections can be announced anytime thereafter.
Sources, however, indicated that the Panchayat elections have been proposed for May.
Significantly, the final date for publication of electoral rolls has been fixed as April 15 which coincides with the date for counting of votes in two seats of by-elections to Lok Sabha including Srinagar and Anantnag, which will go to polls on April 9 and 12 respectively while counting will be held on April 15 and entire election process will be completed the next day.
In another step forward, the State Election Commission, which has been assigned the task of holding Panchayat elections in the State, which were pending since last year, today also appointed Election Returning Officers (EROs) and Assistant Returning Officers (AEROs) for the Panchayat polls. The Commission has already appointed Returning Officers (ROs) for the polls by designating all 22 Deputy Commissioners in the State as the District Panchayat Returning Officers.
The Assistant Commissioners Revenue (ACRs) and Sub Divisional Magistrates (SDMs) have been designated as EROs while Block Development Officers (BDOs) of the concerned blocks have been named as the AEROs.
With this, sources pointed out, all pre-requisites for the Panchayat elections have been completed and final schedule for the elections will be announced after the publication of electoral rolls on April 15 in consultations with the Government provided that situation in the Kashmir valley remains conducive.
“While delimitation of Panchayats has already been completed, the EROs and AEROs were appointed today. The draft electoral rolls have also been put in the public domain. With finalization of electoral rolls,” only schedule has to be announced for the elections.
Sources, however, said that seven districts of the Kashmir Valley, which formed two Lok Sabha seats of Srinagar and Anantnag, which were going to by-polls on April 9 and 12, have been exempted from the purview of finalization of electoral rolls in view of the by-polls.
Besides, snow-bound areas of Loran in Poonch, Gurez, Bagtoor and Tulail in Bandipora have also been left out of the revision of electoral rolls for the time being. These areas along with seven districts would be taken up for updation of electoral rolls in the next few days.
The draft electoral rolls, which were put in public domain today, will be available for the people to file claims, objections and apply for deletion, addition and corrections from March 25 to April 5 while the State Election Commission will launch special campaign from March 30 to April 2. The claims will be disposed of between April 6-10 while updation and printing of electoral rolls will be taken up between April 11 and 14. The final electoral rolls will be published on April 15.
Sources said 280 new Panchayats have been added in the State after delimitation, taking total number of existing Panchayats to 4378. There were 4098 Panchayats in the State when last elections were held to them in 2011. The number of Panch segments has gone up by about 4000, taking total number of Panch constituencies to 33,402. There were 29,402 Panch segments in the State prior to delimitation.
Prior to delimitation, there were 4098 Panchayats in the State including 2145 in the Kashmir division (including Ladakh region) and 1953 in Jammu province. Apart from that, there were 15,767 Panch segments in Kashmir division including Ladakh and 13,635 in Jammu region.
With the State Government through an act of legislation deciding to do away with Sarpanch constituencies by deciding to hold in-direct election to them, there will be only Panch segments in the State now. The Panch segments have been converted into odd-number by the SEC in every Panchayat to facilitate election of Sarpanch from amongst the Panchs.
The Panchayats in Jammu and Kashmir had completed their five-year term on June 16, 2016 as the State Government failed to hold timely elections to them.
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