Patna, (Bihar Times): This is a bizarre case of‘judicial inactivism’. According to reports out of 292
posts of panch for which election is due in Kaimur
district only 128 people filed the nomination. This
notwithstanding the fact that a local panchayat
headman offered free nomination money to anyone
interested in fighting the polls and the district
authorities resorted to aggressive campaigning to
muster social worker groups.
The prime responsibility of the panch is to settle
disputes at the local level.
The district Panchayati Raj officer, Mukesh Kumar
Sinha, while talking to a newspaper explained that
panch’s work is a social service for which they are
not paid by the government. But then even mukhias are
not paid.
Reports said that 383 posts of panchs remained vacant
when the elections for the post of panchayat were held
in April-May 2006. To fill the vacant posts,
byelections to those seats were conducted last month but again, only 91 posts
could be filled, necessitating another bypoll.
However, this time again the purpose may not be served
as only 128 of the total 292 seats are such for which
no nominations have come.
The bottom line, it seems, is that the post of panch
may not be as ‘lucrative’ as of mukhiya.