The Allahabad High Court has asked the Election Commission to postpone the upcoming Uttar Pradesh parliamentary elections for a month or two. It also asked Prime Minister Narendra Modi to ban election-related gatherings in the state and consider postponing state elections due to concerns about the highly contagious Covid variant Omicron. The court made the above observation when hearing an unrelated application for bail.
“If the assembly is not stopped, the result will be worse than the second wave,” Judge Shekhar Yadav said, adding, “Jaan hai toh Jahaan hai (if there is life, we have the world).”
The judge pointed out that the courtroom is often overcrowded because hundreds of cases are listed every day and the large number of people gathered there did not observe social distancing, so the judge expressed these opinions. The judge observed: “As the number of cases of the new variant Omicron continues to increase, a third wave of Covid is possible.” He then cited news reports about the number of Covid cases and mentioned the country that implemented the lockdown.
“The Gram Panchayat election and the Bangladesh parliamentary election have infected many people and caused many deaths,” the judge said. He pointed out that political parties are organizing rallies and gatherings for the upcoming UP parliamentary elections, and it is impossible to follow the Covid agreement in such events. Judge Yadav asked the EC to prohibit any form of assembly and assembly for parliamentary elections, and prohibit direct political parties from campaigning through Doordarshan or newspapers rather than physical events. He quoted Article 21 of the Constitution saying that all Indians have the right to life.
Uttar Pradesh may be the most competitive and politically significant election because it has the most seats in the People’s House that play a key role in the general election. All political parties have started large-scale election campaigns, and star contenders have attracted large crowds at various rallies in the state. People have seen the Prime Minister, the Minister of the Interior, the Chief Minister of the State and the leaders of all major opposition parties speak at large gatherings without the room for abiding by the Covid agreement. Several other gatherings are planned for the rest of this month and early next year.
Complete News Source : NDTV
