ECI tells Telangana High Court it will await Khairatabad poll case

The Election Commission of India has told the Telangana High Court that it will not notify an election for the Khairatabad assembly constituency while a related election petition remains pending. The Commission’s standing counsel, Avinash Desai, presented the position on Thursday during proceedings on a petition filed by former corporator P. Vijaya Reddy.

He also said the ECI would not treat the constituency as a casual vacancy until the petition was finally adjudicated. Reddy, who contested the 2023 assembly election as a Congress candidate, lost to Danam Nagender of the Bharat Rashtra Samithi. She subsequently filed an election petition challenging Nagender’s election on several grounds and asked the High Court to declare her the winner.

Nagender later joined the Congress and contested the Secunderabad Lok Sabha seat, which he lost. The High Court recently disqualified him as an MLA in a separate writ petition filed by the BRS and declared the assembly seat vacant. The Assembly secretariat then issued a vacancy notification.

Reddy, now with the Congress, approached the High Court arguing that the Election Commission should not announce a by-election until her election petition had been decided. Her petition is pending before a bench of Justice B. Vijaysen Reddy.

Senior counsel Vedula Venkataramana, appearing for Reddy, argued that the question of treating the seat as a casual vacancy did not arise while an election petition concerning it was pending. He referred to a Supreme Court judgment and provisions of Sections 84 and 98(c) of the Representation of the People Act, 1951. A division bench comprising Chief Justice Aparesh Kumar Singh and Justice Vakiti Ramakrishna Reddy adjourned the matter to Tuesday.

It directed the ECI to file an affidavit explaining its position.