In Tamil Nadu, the Election Commission on Sunday night cancelled the April 12 bypoll to the R K Nagar Assembly constituency saying the electoral process has been “seriously vitiated” by parties through the use of money power. This decision has been taken after rounds of meeting with Tamil Nadu election officials.
EC said that by-election to fill the vacancy this constituency in Chennai, will be held in its due course “when the vitiating effect created by the distribution of money and gift items to allure the electors, gets removed with the passage of time and the atmosphere in the constituency becomes conducive to the holding of free and fair election”, it said.
In a 29-page order, the commission said that the election to elect a member from the R.K. Nagar constituency to “the Tamil Nadu legislative assembly shall stand rescinded forthwith”.
“The Commission is fully satisfied that the current electoral process…in Tamil Nadu has been seriously vitiated on account of unlawful activities of the candidates and political parties and their workers by bribing the electors and unlawfully inducing them by offering money and other gifts of consumable items to woo them in their favour,” the EC said in an order late on Sunday night.
The bypoll to R.K. Nagar constituency was necessitated following the death of former chief minister J. Jayalalithaa on 5 December. This decision from the EC comes soon after Income Tax searches in properties and offices of Tamil Nadu Health Minister C Vijayabaskar on Friday.
The EC in its order also mentioned “the innovative ways which the political parties and their leaders at the top echelons have devised to bypass the law enforcing authorities entrusted with the task of keeping an eye on the unauthorized and illegal expenses incurred in the conduct of election campaigns of their party candidates need to be dealt with heavy hand”.
