Door-to-door survey must to identify BC voters: Lawyers

LAWYER B. Rachna Reddy points out that neither AP nor Telangana has done any scientific survey so far.

Advocates say that the Backward Classes identified for the purpose of Article 15(4) of the Constitution has no application while deciding and providing political reservation to backward classes in local bodies.

They said that the door-to-door survey was mandatory to identify the BC voters under the Gram Panchayat Rules 2007 which deal with denotification, deletion, show cause, objections and re-notification of wards pursuant to Section 295 of the Telangana State Panchayat Raj Act 2018.

B. Rachna Reddy, High Court advocate, said that Section 17 of the Telangana State Panchayat Raj Act, 2018 (TS PR Act), does not provide for exclusion of any category of Gram Panchayats before calculating the posts of chairpersons of BCs or other categories.

K.S. Murthy, who also practices in the High Court said that the Supreme Court has held that elections to Panchayat Raj bodies is to be conducted only after identification of BC voters through a scientific survey.

Lawyer B. Rachna Reddy points out that neither AP nor Telangana has done any scientific survey so far.

Mr Murthy said that Section 4 of the PESA Act and Section 255 of the TS PR Act, 2018 reserves the sarpanch posts only for Schedule Tribes (STs).

He explained, “It also says that members of the panchayat should be proportionate to their population. If SCs present in these Scheduled Areas are excluded from the calculation of sarpanches in accordance with their population proportion in the state, then Scheduled Castes would stand to lose constitutionally guaranteed reservation in accordance with their proportion.”