Indore: After a special bench of Madhya Pradesh High Court vacated a stay, counting of votes for first phase of panchayat election in Madhya Pradesh finally started on Thursday morning.
Within minutes of the HC order, the State Election Commission issued directives to all district election officers to start the counting of ballots. The counting was put on hold following a stay by Indore bench of the court on a petition.
Earlier, Jabalpur bench of the HC had stayed the counting of votes of first phase of panchayat elections on the petition by State Congress chief Arun Yadav. Later the court dismissed the petition.
Following the court order, the preparations for counting were done and counting was supposed to take place on Thursday.
But before that, a fresh petition claiming irregularities in the elections was moved in Indore bench that granted stay on counting of votes on Wednesday. To solve this legal deadlock, the state government approached the Chief Justice of MPHC who constituted a special bench to hear the matter on priority basis and on Thursday morning the stay was vacated.
