Supreme Court Clears Way for Local Body Elections in Andhra Pradesh

The Supreme Court has cleared the way for the process of conducting local body elections in Andhra Pradesh to proceed, according to the report. The YSR Congress Party (YSRCP) had sought to defer the elections until the completion of the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls. The court did not grant the requested relief, while the State Election Commission informed it that it was prepared to issue the election notification within six weeks, in line with the High Court’s direction. The court indicated that if the SIR process was completed before the notification, the revised rolls could be used; otherwise, elections could proceed using the existing rolls. The Andhra Pradesh High Court had directed the state government and the Election Commission to initiate the election process promptly, preferably within six weeks.

In a separate matter, the Supreme Court declined to interfere with the High Court’s decision setting aside the Andhra Pradesh government’s orders providing 34% reservation for Backward Classes (BCs) in local body elections. The High Court had held that the overall reservation for Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes and BCs exceeded the 50% ceiling. The state government had challenged that ruling in the Supreme Court. During the proceedings, the court questioned whether the government had implemented the recommendations of a dedicated commission and declined to grant relief against the High Court’s order. The government may need to complete the required data-collection exercise and meet the applicable legal requirements before revisiting the reservation percentage.