Supreme Court declines common symbols to political parties

Unrecognised political parties contesting coming assembly elections in five states, including Tamil superstar Vijaykant's Desiya Murpokku Dravida Kazhagam (DMDK), today suffered a setback with the Supreme Court declining to entertain their plea for common symbols.

A bench of Justice Altamas Kabir and Justice Cyriac Joseph declined to grant any interim relief to 11 unrecognized political parties seeking common symbols but said it would take up on May 3 for final disposal the batch of petitions and cross appeal filed by the Election Commission on the issue.

"It would certainly be to the advantage of the registered unrecognized political parties if they were able to put up candidates on a common symbol. On the other hand, if all registered unrecognized political parties were to be provided with a common symbol, prima facie, it would render the provisions of the Election Symbols Order, 1968, completely unworkable and destroy the very object it seeks to achieve.

"Having regard to the aforesaid two possibilities, we are not inclined to make any interim arrangement similar to that made on an earlier occasion", the apex court said in a judgment.

The apex court said the precedent set by it in 2009 by alloting common symbols as an interim arrangement to three political parties, Praja Rajyam, Lok Satta and DMDK cannot be followed this time asthere were more number of unrecognized political parties in this year's elections scheduled between April and May.