Vijay Arora
Shimla, January 4
The Himachal High Court has rejected the plea of the state government seeking exemption from undertaking fresh delimitation of zila parishad ward Tikkar (reserved for SC) in Shimla.
The government had approached the High Court stating that it was impractical to carry out delimitation because the zila parishad general elections were tentatively scheduled for December 2020, for which delimitation had to be started in June or July. It would also affect the territorial and geographical limits of other wards.
While rejecting the contentions of the state, a Division Bench comprising Chief Justice L Narayana Swamy and Justice Jyotsna Rewal Dua observed that "the direction to undertake delimitation of Tikkar was issued by the Single Bench of the High Court on December 15, 2016, and the delimitation process should have been commenced immediately thereafter. But the state authorities waited till the dismissal of the appeal by the High Court and the special leave petition by the Supreme Court, though there was no interim order granted by any court".
The court also reprimanded the state that once an order was passed under Article 226 of the Constitution of India, it had to be complied with, irrespective of the circumstances. It added that any order passed by the writ court in exercise of its power under Article 226 could not be permitted to be tinkered with.
The court said, "The appeal was dismissed on May 3, 2017, and the special leave petition on May 3, 2019, and if the state authorities had taken steps for delimitation even after the dismissal of the special leave petition, they had sufficient time to undertake the process. But instead of taking steps to initiate delimitation, the state authorities preferred the present application even after the dismissal of the special leave petition."
Courtesy: Tribune News Service
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