ECI not to conduct bypolls to five constituencies in Tamil Nadu until disposal of election petitions, Madras High Court told

The Election Commission of India (ECI) on Monday (August 24, 2026) informed the Madras High Court that it does not intend to notify bye-elections to the Tiruchi East, Perundurai, Ambasamudram, Viralimalai, and Karur Assembly constituencies until the disposal of election petitions with respect to these five constituencies.

The submission was made in a counter affidavit filed before the first Division Bench of Chief Justice Sushrut Arvind Dharmadhikari and Justice G. Arul Murugan in response to a public interest litigation (PIL) petition filed by K. Venkatachalapathy of Tirunelveli through his counsel V.R. Shanmuganathan.

Filing the counter affidavit through ECI standing counsel Niranjan Rajagopalan, Tamil Nadu’s Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) Archana Patnaik said: “The commission does not propose to announce or notify bye-elections until the election petitions challenging the election of the returned candidates in the five constituencies are decided.”

Explaining the reasons for such a decision, the CEO said, the Supreme Court had in Sanjeevayya versus The Election Tribunal, Andhra Pradesh (1967) had held that the ECI was not bound to hold a bye-election to a constituency if an election petitioner had sought to declare himself/herself as the returned candidate.

The top court had held that if an election petitioner had not just challenged the victory of the returned candidate but had also moved an application, under Section 84 of the Representation of the People Act of 1951, to declare himself/herself as a returned candidate, the conduct of a bye-election to such a constituency before the disposal of the election petition may give rise to competing claims to the same seat.

Thereafter, in 1996, Parliament inserted Section 151-A to the RP Act of 1951 prescribing a timeline of six months, from the date when the vacancy arises, for the conduct of bye-elections. However, the newly inserted provision came up for consideration before the Supreme Court in Election Commission of India versus Telangana Rashtra Samithi (2010).

The top court, after considering the 1967 verdict in Sanjeevayya, had expressly held that Section 151-A of the Act could not be interpreted so as to render Section 84 ineffective and that both provisions must be construed harmoniously. “Hence, a constituency in which an election petition seeking a declaration under Section 84 is already pending, is not availbale for bye-election on occurrence of a casual vacancy,” the counter affidavit read.

The CEO also brought it to the notice of the court that Chief Minister C. Joseph Vijay, S. Jeyakumar, E. Subaya alias Esakki Subaya, C. Vijayabaskar, and M.R. Vijayabhaskar had got elected from the Tiruchi East, Perundurai, Ambasamudram, Viralimalai, and Karur Assembly constituencies in May 2026 but all of them had subsequently submitted their resignations.

Nevertheless, since election petitions had been filed with respect to all of those five constituencies and the petitioners had also sought to declare themselves as the returned candidates, the ECI does not intend to conduct bye-elections to these constituencies, the court was told.

After taking the counter affidavit on file, the Chief Justice’s Bench adjourned the writ petition to September 8, 2026, and extended until then, an interim order passed by it on July 10, 2026, restraining the ECI from notifying the bypolls for the five constituencies.