Bhubaneawar, December 25: Following the Orissa High Court’s order, the State Government revised its seat reservation list for the post of Zilla Parishad chairperson in all the 30 districts for the upcoming three-tier Panchayat elections and released the draft notification on Friday.
The Government has reserved 12 seats for SC and ST categories. As many as seven seats are reserved for Scheduled Tribe candidates while five seats are reserved for SC candidates.
Earlier, four ZP seats had been reserved for Other Backward Classes (OBCs). Now, in the fresh notification, not a single seat has been reserved for this community.
As per the notification published by the Panchayati Raj Department, the Government has reserved the ZP chief post in Kendrapara, Jagatsinghpur, Jajpur, Boudh and Bhadrak districts for the SC category while the same has been reserved for ST category in Kandhamal, Koraput, Nabarangpur, Mayurbhanj, Malkangiri, Rayagada, and Sundargarh districts.
Similarly, Zilla Parishad chief posts of 10 districts – Angul, Cuttack, Kalahandi, Keonjhar, Gajapati, Deogarh, Nayagarh, Bargarh, Balasore, and Sonepur have been put under unreserved category.
However, the notification did not mention anything on the reservation in Khurda, Ganjam, Jharsuguda, Dhenkanal, Nuapada, Puri, Bolangir and Sambalpur districts.
Moreover, the State Government has reserved 50 per cent of all ZP chief posts for women candidates in 15 districts – Kalahandi, Kendrapara, Koraput, Khurda, Ganjam, Jharsuguda, Dhenkanal, Nuapada, Puri, Bolangir, Boudh, Malkangiri, Jajpur, Rayagada and Sambalpur.
Citing two recent Supreme Court orders issued on December 6 and 17, the Orissa high court on Wednesday said, “There can be no reservation yet provided for BCCs (backward class citizens) in the post of sarpanches in Odisha in the elections to be held. It is inevitable, therefore, for the government of Odisha to re-work the draft notification for holding of elections to the panchayats, panchayat samitis and Zilla Parishads in 2022.”
