India News | Bihar Civic Polls May Be Held with Quotas: HC

Patna, Oct 19 (PTI) The Patna High Court on Wednesday ruled that civic polls in Bihar may be held, with seats reserved for Extremely Backward Classes, based on the report of a survey conducted by the statutory commission concerned.

A division bench headed by Chief Justice Sanjay Karol passed the judgement on a review petition of the state government against an order dated October 4.

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The earlier order had declared the quotas as "illegal" and held that fresh polls be held by "re-notifying" the reserved seats as those belonging to the general category.

The court seemed satisfied with the submissions of the state government. The review petition was, therefore, disposed of, Advocate General Lalit Kishor told PTI over phone.

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"We submitted that the state government was willing to fulfill the criteria laid down by the Supreme Court, which the high court had cited while striking down the reservation system,” he said.

The Supreme Court ruling says that quotas in elections must be based on the recommendations of an independent commission that may have looked into the political backwardness of a social group, Kishor said.

"We pointed out that an EBC Commission was already in place and that it be treated as the independent commission based on the recommendations of which fresh polls could be held, with seats reserved for EBCs. The court agreed," he added.

Urban local body polls were earlier scheduled in two phases on October 10 and October 20, but the high court order had thrown a spanner, prompting the State Election Commission to defer the elections.

Meanwhile, the opposition BJP alleged that Chief Minister Nitish Kumar's arrogance had caused the state government to "surrender".

Senior BJP leader and former Deputy CM Sushil Kumar Modi said in a statement: "Nitish Kumar owes an explanation to hundreds of candidates who had spent money on campaign and will have to start the process all over again. It was because of his obstinacy that legal infirmities in the state's quota system were not addressed in time".

The order passed a fortnight ago had triggered a blame game between the CM's JD(U) and the BJP, which was its alliance partner until the break-up in August.

(The above story is verified and authored by Press Trust of India (PTI) staff. PTI, India’s premier news agency, employs more than 400 journalists and 500 stringers to cover almost every district and small town in India.. The views appearing in the above post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY)