DMK principal secretary K.N. Nehru has filed a public interest litigation petition in the Madras High Court to restrain the State government from interfering with decisions taken by village panchayats to conduct grama sabha meetings.
He also urged the court to declare as illegal the cancellation of grama sabha meetings scheduled to be held on October 2 and issue a consequential direction to the government to ensure that the meetings were conducted within three weeks.
According to the litigant, the State government did not conduct local body elections for long number of years. It was only after orders were passed by the Supreme Court and the High Court that elections were held partially for 9,424 out of 15,525 village panchayats in December last. DMK candidates won most of the Panchayat president posts and assumed office.
As per the Tamil Nadu Panchayat Act of 1994, grama sabha meetings should be conducted twice every year and as per executive instructions issued by the government, they should be conducted on January 26, May 1, August 15 and October 2.
Recently, the Centre had brought in the Farmers (Empowerment and Protection) Agreement on Price Assurance and Farm Services Act of 2020, the Farmers' Produce, Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Act of 2020 and also an amendment to the Essential Commodities Act. These legislation were opposed nationwide by farmers and Opposition parties.
Hence, DMK president M.K. Stalin had urged the villagers to pass resolutions against the legislations in the grama sabha meetings on October 2. On coming to know about the request made by the Leader of the Opposition, the government illegally cancelled those meetings, the petitioner claimed.
