Rural poll nominations begin today, oppn awaits lists of reserved seats

Even as the process to file nomination papers for the panchayat poll is set to start tomorrow, leaders of the Opposition parties have alleged that they are yet to get the lists regarding reservation for the posts of sarpanch and panch.

28 booths in 13 villages sensitive

Polling booths have been set up in all 91 villages in Phagwara. SDM Jashanjit Singh said 28 booths were considered sensitive booths which were set up at village Mauli, Jamalpur, Miherru, Jagatpur-Jattan, Bhakhariana, Bhularai, Khalwara, Ranipur, Panchhat, Rehana-Jattan, Malikpur,Rampur Khalian and Sangatpur.

They said while those working for the ruling Aam Aadmi Party were aware of the reserved seats and had already started making preparations accordingly, they were still kept in the dark and could not select candidates.

Shahkot Congress MLA Hardev Laddi said, “We have been repeatedly trying to get information regarding villages where the posts of sarpanch have been reserved. Till date, we do not know whether we should be able to field the candidate whom we zeroed in on or need to pick a woman general candidate, an SC canddidate or a woman SC candidate. On the contrary, AAP leaders in our area have all the details available with them. Whatever small information we have is through their workers only”.

Likewise, former Akali Dal MLA from Phillaur Baldev Khera too said, “No lists of reservation for the posts of sarpanch and panch could be made available to us. The interested candidates from Phillaur have been running around to get the lists but to no avail”.

Deputy Commissioner, Jalandhar, Himanshu Mahajan said, “There hardly was any time available for us for uploading the lists as the elections got announced just a day ago. We will be uploading the lists of reserved posts of sarpanch and panch on the portal jalandhar.nic.in by late evening today. We have provided hard copies to some leaders who approached us this evening. We have some limited hard copies available with us, which we should be able to deliver tomorrow.”