HC closes petition filed by UDF Election Committee Chairman

Kochi, Nov 30 (UNI) A Division Bench of the Kerala High Court comprising Justice J B Koshy and Justice K Padmanabhan Nair today closed the petition filed by Thiruvambadi UDF Election Committee Chairman A Aravindan.

In his petition, he submitted that police force, not under the control of Kerala government, should be deployed for the purpose of conducting the by-election in Thiruvambadi scheduled on December four, 2006 and also to install sufficient numbers of video cameras in polling booths.

The Court, before closing the petition, also recorded the submissions of the state government and Election Commission.

The state government and Election Commission informed the court that they had taken steps, including deployment of five companies of CRPF, to ensure free and fair election in Thiruvambadi constituency.

The Commission also made it clear that Police from outside state cannot be deployed for the by-election as the Kerala police was conversant with the geographical aspect of the constituency.

The commission also said they had installed sufficient number of digital cameras in the polling stations and 99.23 percentage of the voters had voter identity cards.

The Court directed the authorities to ensure that the polling agents were not intimidated.

UNI XR AJ PK RN2258