Punjab local body polls: SC refuses to entertain last minute challenge to use of ballot papers

The Supreme Court on Monday junked a plea challenging Punjab State Election Commission’s decision of holding the polls for municipal corporations, municipal councils and nagar panchayats through ballot papers.

“Elections are tomorrow, what can be done now? There is no time left,” a bench led by Chief Justice of India Surya Kant said.

The comments from the bench came after senior counsel Nachiketa Joshi submitted on behalf of petitioner Ruchita Garg that it was the first time that the ballot papers were being used in the recent past and that the top court itself had said that EVMs were the norm.

Questioning petitioner Ruchita Garg for being late in moving the court, the bench – which also included Justice Joymalya Bagchi and Justice Vipul M Pancholi – said, it can’t destabilise the election process at this juncture.

“There was no need for you to wait for the formal notification of the election schedule being issued. You knew that elections were to be held. There have been several rounds of litigation earlier,” it said.

Polling for 104 municipal bodies, including eight municipal corporations in Punjab, will be held on May 26. The counting of votes will take place on May 29.

As Joshi said that the Election Commission has agreed to make available the requisite EVMs, the bench said EC was not conducting the elections and that the authority conducting the elections was not before it.

The court would not “second-guess” the decision of State Election Commission and that there was no “jurisdictional error” in the decision, it noted.

“The ultimate master is State Election Commission. If State Election Commission did not have the power to use ballot papers, we would have injuncted… Ballot paper election has not been deleted from the scheme of the municipal election. It is open to State Election Commission to choose between ballot papers and EVM,” Justice Baghchi said.

“We agree that the Supreme Court in the ADR judgment held that it would be a regressive step to go back to ballot papers. But as the election process has started, it would be unwise for us to interfere when the rules do not exclude ballot papers,” he added.

The petitioner had challenged the Punjab and Haryana High Court’s decision refusing to stop Punjab municipal elections from being conducted through ballot papers.

The Punjab Municipal Election Rules, 1994 contained provisions for both EVMs and ballot papers, the high court had pointed out.