Chennai: Poll-time PILs pile up at Madras high court the moment parliamentary, assembly and local body elections are announced, every single time. This election season is no different. A wave of PILs bearing repetitive and strikingly similar reliefs, filed by a familiar group of petitioners, has hit the court this time as well. Far from reflecting genuine public interest and winning public remedy, these PILs end up mostly as being dismissed or withdrawn.The reliefs sought are nothing new — stop distribution of cash and gifts to voters; protect EVMs from tampering; install CCTVs at all polling booths and strong rooms; enforce Model Code of Conduct (MCC); and make voting compulsory for all eligible citizens. This season, PIL petitioners have dropped one such relief – purification of voters list, in view of SIR process conducted by Election Commission (ECI) well before the announcement of election.On April 7 alone, the first bench headed by Chief Justice Sushrut Arvind Dharmadhikari refused to entertain four such PILs. A petitioner, T Prabhakaran, wanted the court to direct the organisers of IPL to either postpone or shift the venue of two matches conducted at MA Chidambaram Stadium, Chennai.Another PIL moved by advocate M L Ravi sought HC to direct ECI to prevent misuse of reserved election symbols allotted to recognised political parties. He alleged candidates affiliated with other parties are allowed to contest on reserved symbols allotted to major recognised political parties. In 2019, the same petitioner approached the court to declare the election of four TN Lok Sabha members who contested in the 2019 election on symbols allotted to other political parties null and void.A PIL seeking strict implementation of MCC and prevention of distribution of cash and gifts to voters is filed during all election seasons, while petitions regarding EVMs are missing this season. On April 1, a plea moved by a Madurai-based petitioner K K Ramesh, a repeat PIL petitioner seeking prevention of distribution of cash and gifts, was dismissed by the court as ‘publicity litigation.’
