New Delhi: The Delhi High Court on Wednesday
dismissed a batch of petitions seeking quashing of a state EC
notification by which seats for Scheduled Caste candidates
were reserved in the upcoming polls of trifurcated Municipal
Corporation of Delhi (MCD).
"We do not find any merit in the petitions, they are
dismissed," a bench of justices Sanjay Kishan Kaul and Rajiv
Shakdher said while refusing to allow as many as 12 petitions
filed by MCD councillors challenging the notification.
The court said that the delegation of power by the Delhi
government to the state EC for issuing the notification for
reserving seats for SC candidates was not unconstitutional.
The court also upheld the decision of the state EC to
reserve seats for the SC candidates on the basis of 2001
census.
The councillors had sought quashing of the notification
alleging that the method adopted by the state EC reserving
seats for scheduled caste candidates was faulty.
They alleged that method has led to a situation where a
ward, having 40 per cent of SC population has been made a
general ward, while another one having 16 per cent SCs has
been made a reserved one.
They had also contended that the poll panel was wrong in
considering the population of SCs in assembly constituencies
instead of taking into account their numbers in the municipal
wards, while reserving seats for them.
The plea, however, was opposed by the counsel for the
Election Commission, who said the rationale behind the
reservation was to give due representation to SC candidates.
The court, however, had made it clear that the coming
polls for the trifurcated MCD would not be stayed.
The MCD had recently been trifurcated into North Delhi,
East Delhi and South Delhi Municipal Corporations and polls
for the civic agencies would be held in April.
PTI
