Chennai: Madras high court on Tuesday extended the stay against notifying byelections till Sept 28 for five Assembly constituencies in Tamil Nadu which were declared vacant in view of resignation of elected MLAs.The first bench of Chief Justice Sushrut Arvind Dharmadhikari and Justice G Arul Murugan passed the order after adjourning the PIL for final hearing.The issue pertains to a PIL moved by K Venkatachalapathy, a BJP functionary from Palayamkottai, a ban announcement of byelections to Trichy East, Karur, Viralimalai, Perundurai and Ambasamudram assembly constituencies on the ground that election petitions concerning the constituencies were pending.Passing an interim order, the court stayed the announcement of byelections in all five constituencies. Election Commission (ECI) also filed a counter-affidavit stating that byelections would not be announced until the disposal of the election petitions.On Tuesday, when the plea came up for hearing senior advocate S Muralidhar submitted that the election petition pertaining to Perundirai constituency has been dismissed by a single judge and therefore, the stay against announcing byelection to the constituency must be vacated.However, the bench refused to pass any order till they receive the copy of the judgement dismissing the election petition and instead adjourned the hearing to Sept 28.Representing the ECI, Niranjan Rajagopal submitted that the commission had not yet received a copy of the order dismissing the election petition and that it would be produced before the court once received.
