Coronavirus delays polls in 6 municipalities in Rajasthan

The upcoming civic elections scheduled on April 5 in six municipal corporations, including Jaipur, Jodhpur and Kota have been postponed by six weeks due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Jaipur, March 18 The upcoming civic elections scheduled on April 5 in six municipal corporations, including Jaipur, Jodhpur and Kota have been postponed by six weeks due to the coronavirus pandemic.

The decision was announced by the bench of justices which comprised Sangeet Raj Lodha and Manoj Kumar Vyas.

The state government filed a plea in the High Court on Tuesday praying postponement of the elections in the wake of corona fears. Advocate General MS Singhvi, while presenting an application on behalf of the local self government department, said that despite the declaration of a global pandemic of corona, holding elections would put people at risk of infection.

Therefore, the polls should be postponed, he appealed.

Apart from the government, around nine people including Advocate Poonamchand Bhandari, Advocate Anand Sharma and Advocate Vijay Pathak had also filed a PIL in this regard. All these petitions, including the state government's, were heard on Wednesday.

The PILs filed in this perspective said that at a time when the Central and state government have issued several advisories to prevent this infected disease and a group of 50 people gathering is not allowed to be together and even socio-religious events cant hold more than 50 people at one place, holding elections can bring in risk to people's lives.

"The Election Commission is ignoring the advisory of the Central and State Government. In such a situation, elections should be postponed for now," it said.

There was a tug of war going in between the state government and the state election commission on issue of postponement of elections. while the former wanted the elections to be postponed, the latter argued on it quoting there were no positive cases of corona in Kota and Jodhpur and so why should the polls be postponed.

( With inputs from IANS )