Chandigarh, Sep 28 (IANS): As the panchayat elections in Punjab are slated on October 15, the Leader of the Opposition Partap Bajwa on Saturday approached the Punjab State Election Commission (PSEC) to get rid of the complications being faced by candidates in filing nominations and voters.

A delegation of the Punjab Congress leaders headed by Bajwa handed over a memorandum to PSEC’s Commissioner Raj Kamal Chaudhary and urged him to smoothen the process to ensure an equal playing field.

The leaders comprised former ministers Tripat Rajinder Bajwa and Balbir Singh Sidhu and former legislator Madan Lal Jalalpur.

Addressing the media, Bajwa said the voters’ lists that are being taken into account for the elections have the qualifying date as January 2023, while the Lok Sabha elections were held with the qualifying date set as January 1, 2024.

As a result, a voter who became eligible to cast a vote or contest elections as a member or sarpanch of Gram Panchayats, as the case may be, on January 1, 2024, might be deprived of their right to the franchise due to this discrepancy.

"In some blocks, the lists of Sarpanch’s reservation, ward’s reservation, and voter list had been made unavailable for the voters and the candidates. This has created uncertainty among the candidates in particular,” Bajwa said.

He said the delegation demanded the voter lists and lists of reserved sarpanch and ward should be uploaded on the website of the Deputy Commissioner of the district.

The Election Commissioner has acknowledged this demand. Besides this, clarification related to the ‘Chullah tax’ or the utilisation of cash from the Panchayat fund needs to be issued.

“A fresh Scheduled Caste (SC) certificate is typically issued at birth for individuals belonging to the SC category. This certificate remains valid throughout their lifetime. During elections, it is advisable not to insist on obtaining a new SC certificate to prevent unnecessary harassment of people who want to contest panchayat election,” he added.