Chennai: A lawyer has moved the Madras high court seeking to restrain the Election Commission of India (ECI) from holding by-elections to fill the vacancies in Madurantakam and Dharapuram Assembly constituencies.Advocate K Suthan wanted the court to direct the ECI to examine and initiate necessary legislative and regulatory measures to create a mechanism for ensuring financial accountability of elected representatives who voluntarily and prematurely resign from their seats without legally recognized compelling circumstances.He suggested introduction of “Election Expenditure Security” to recover the cost of the resultant by-elections and to examine and initiate necessary legislative measures to introduce a statutory disqualification or a reasonable cooling-off period to prevent elected representatives who voluntarily and prematurely resign from contesting subsequent elections for a prescribed period.As to the notified by-election to the two constituencies, the petitioner wanted the court to direct the ECI to mandate payment of ‘Election Expenditure Security’ by Maragatham Kumaravel and P Sathyabama who resigned from Maduranthakam and Dharapuram constituencies immediately after their election. The deposit must be made as a pre-condition for filing nomination papers for the by-election, the petitioner said.The petitioner has also sought the court to direct the ECI to file a detailed report on the estimated expenditure to be incurred for conducting the by-elections for Trichy East, Karur, Viralimalai, Perundurai, Ambasamudram, Madurantakam and Dharapuram constituencies which have been necessitated by the resignations of the respective MLA’s.The plea is likely to be taken up for hearing by the first bench headed by Chief Justice Sushrut Arvind Dharmadhikari on Wednesday.
