Jabalpur: A Madhya Pradesh high court judge pulled up a senior IAS officer for declaring a losing candidate in the panchayat elections as the winner. The court declared that the Panna district collector Sanjay Mishra should be removed as he is not fit to hold the post. Justice Vivek Aggarwal observed, “he’s acting as a political agent. He is not fit to be a collector, should be removed as a collector”.
The court made these remarks while hearing the petition against the wrongful declaration of the winner in the last month’s vice-chairperson polls in Gunnor Janpad Panchayat.
The 25-member strong Gunnor Janpad Panchayat held elections for the post of chairperson and vice-chairperson on July 27. In the vice-chairperson poll, the congress-backed candidate Parmanand Sharma had defeated rival Ramshiromani Mishra (backed by BJP). Parmanand Sharma secured 13 out of 25 votes and was issued the election certificate the same day. However, Panna district collector called for a fresh election the next day through a lottery system and declared the losing candidate Ramshiromani Mishra as the winner.