HC notice to govt on reduction of Shimla civic body ward numbers

Legal Correspondent

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Shimla, March 16

The High Court of Himachal Pradesh today issued a notice to the state government and the State Election Commission on a petition challenging the government decision to reduce the number of wards of the Shimla Municipal Corporation (SMC) from 41 to 34.

A Division Bench comprising Acting Chief Justice Sabina and Justice Satyen Vaidya issued the notice on the petition filed by Rajinder Thakur, who contended that the number of wards were reduced from 41 to 34 in violation of the provisions of the HP Municipal Corporation Act, 1994 as well as the HP Municipal Corporation (Election) Rules, 2012. The court directed the state as well as the State Election Commission to file their replies by March 28.

Senior Advocate Satya Pal Jain along with advocate Virbahadur Verma, appearing for the petitioner, contended before the court that when the whole exercise of increasing the number of wards from 34 to 41 was as per the law, there was no justification in amending the Act for reducing the number from 41 to 34.

They contended that even otherwise after reducing the number of wards from 41 to 34, the process of delimitation of even 34 wards was required to be done again, as per the rules. Therefore, both reduction of the number of wards from 41 to 34 as well as adopting old delimitation were illegal, unconstitutional and liable to be quashed.

The previous BJP government had delimited Shimla MC wards and increased their number from 34 to 41. However, the present Congress government reversed the decision and abolished seven new wards in the city. Now, the civic body has 34 wards.