BHUBANESWAR: State panchayati raj minister Pratap Jena on Tuesday said the three-tier panchayat elections in the state will be held on time and the government would soon submit the status report to the state election commission (SEC).
Panchayat polls in the state are due in February next year as tenure of all the panchayati raj institutions (PRI) — gram panchayats, panchayat samitis and zilla parishads — ends on March 10, 2022. “We have made a detailed programme for the rural polls and are going to submit it to the SEC soon. The government is fully prepared and the panchayat polls will be held on time,” Jena said.
The SEC had earlier written twice to the state government to complete the delimitation process and seat reservation for timely conduct of the polls. Official sources in panchayati raj department said there will be no delimitation of PRIs as it was last done in 2017 while seat reservation process for SC/ST and backward classes will be finalized soon. The government is likely to amend the panchayat laws — the Orissa Grama Panchayat Act-1964, the Orissa Panchayat Samiti Act-1999 and the Orissa Zilla Parishad Act-1991 to limit reservation of seats within 50%. The current set of reservation in PRIs exceeds 50%.
With only six months left for the polls, the BJD, BJP and Congress have started fine-tuning activities as the rural polls are considered as precursor to the general elections. The gram panchayat and panchayat samiti polls may not be fought on party symbols but are known to gauge the mood of the people towards the political parties.
