The court affirmed that petitions should not interfere in electoral processes unless clear illegality is established.

JUDGMENT

This writ petition is filed seeking the following reliefs:

“i. Issue a writ of certiorari or any other appropriate writ, order or direction, quashing the Notification dated 05.11.2025 issued by the 2nd Respondent, to the extent it reserves the office of President of the Respondent No.6 Areacode Block Panchayat for Women (General) category for the forthcoming 2025 Local Body Elections;

ii. Issue a writ of mandamus or any other appropriate writ, order or direction, commanding the Respondents to reconsider and re-notify the reservation of the office of President of the Respondent No.6 Areacode Block Panchayat strictly in accordance with Article 243D(4) of the Constitution of India and Rule 3 of the Kerala Panchayat Raj (Election of President and Vice President) Rules , 1995, ensuring proper rotation of reservation;

iii. Declare that the reservation of the Office of President of the Respondent No.6 Areacode Block Panchayat for Women (General) category for the 2025 Local Body Elections is illegal, unconstitutional, and in violation of Article 243D(4) of the Constitution of India and Rule 3 of the Kerala Panchayat Raj (Election of President and Vice President) Rules , 1995;

iv. To dispense off with translation of vernacular documents to English;

v. Issue such other writ, order or direction as this Hon’ble Court may deem just, fit and proper in the facts and circumstances of the case, in the interest of justice.”

[SIC]

2. The main prayer in this Writ Petition is to quash the notification dated 05.11.2025 issued by the 2nd respondent to the extent it reserves the office of President of the 6th respondent Areacode Block Panchayat for women (General) category for the forthcoming 2025 Local Boady Election.

3. Heard the learned counsel appearing for the petitioner, the learned Standing Counsel appearing for the Kerala State Election Commission and the learned Special Government Pleader.

4. A preliminary objection is raised by the Standing Counsel appearing for the State Election Commission stating that this Court cannot entertain the prayers in this Writ Petition in the light of the dictum laid down by this Court in State of Kerala and Others v. Noufal Babu E.K. and Others [2020 KHC 5613]. It is submitted that the general election for the year 2025 has already been declared. I will consider that point first.

5. Admittedly, the State Election Commission declared the general election to the local bodies for the year 2025 on 10.11.2025. The election is scheduled to be conducted on 09.12.2025 and 11.12.2025. Whether this Court can interfere in such situation is the question to be decided. In Noufal Babu’s case (supra), this Court considered the matter in detail. To know the facts of the case, I will extract paragraph No.1 and to know the dictum laid down in the judgment, I will extract paragraph No.70 of the above judgment:

“1. The writ appeals are filed by the State and its officials, and the Kerala State Election Commission as captioned above, challenging the judgments dated 16-11-2020, 19.11.2020 and 20.11.2020 rendered by the learned single Judge in various writ petitions, whereby the learned single Judge allowed the writ petitions and directed the Kerala State Election Commission to recast the reservation by rotation to the office of the President and Chairpersons of the local bodies in question, pursuant to the notifications issued by the State Election Commission dated 03.11.2020 in that regard, which is a process of the General Elections notified by the State Election Commission. Though one of the writ petitions was filed earlier to the notification issued by the State Election Commission and the other writ petitions were filed on 06.11.2020 i.e., the date of the announcement of elections by the State Election Commission