Kollam: The election of the office-bearers to the SNDP Yogam Council will get prolonged in view of the Kerala High Court's order nullifying the hitherto representative voting pattern of one vote for 200 Yogam members.
Now, the ball is in the LDF Government's court as the High Court pronounced that anyone can approach the State Government with the plea for allowing the continuance of the representative pattern for the Yogam elections.
The only option before the present Yogam leadership is to approach the State Government with the plea for representational voting. However in such a scenario, the elections cannot be conducted till the State Government takes a decision on such a plea.
The Yogam elections, which are held every five years, were actually due in 2020. But because of the tough COVID-19 situation, it got prolonged. Finally, it was decided to hold elections on February 5.
All steps were taken to hold polls that involved almost 10,000 voters representing 31-lakh members of the Yogam. The decision was to ensure 30 polling centres and a separate e-voting facility apart from holding the general body meeting online.
But the elections got shelved as cases were filed in the High Court against the move. But since the High Court has now made it clear that the earlier elections held in the Yogam as per the representative nature would not be treated as infructuous, the present leadership led by general secretary Vellappally Natesan can continue to rule the Yogam till the fresh elections are over. Such a provision is also given in the bylaw of the Yogam.
Representative voting system began in 1966
The provision of one vote for 100 Yogam members for the election of office-bearers was introduced in 1966 by ending the system of right to vote for all members. But after the amendment got entangled in legal battles, the then SNDP leadership managed to procure a special exemption order from the Central Government for this kind of representative voting. Then there were only 60,000 members in the Yogam.
The same system continued till Vellappally Natesan took over the reins of the Yogam. In 1999, the democratic space in the Yogam got further diminished with a new amendment making one representative vote for 200 members.
But now the High Court unequivocally made it clear that all members of the Yogam have the right to vote for electing their office-bearers. The court also said that the Yogam did not fall under the Companies Act passed by Parliament, but it came under the Non-trading Companies Act passed by the state government.
But there are apprehensions that conducting an election involving lakhs of members will not be practical.
The High Court also spelt out that just like the earlier instance of securing special exemption from the Centre, the State Government can be approached for giving permission for representative elections.
With this power given by the High Court order, the decision of the present LDF Government is going to be crucial on the election of the office-bearers to the biggest social organisation of the Ezhava caste in the State.
Vellappally comes down heavily on detractors
Meanwhile, Yogam general secretary Vellapally Natesan told media persons that they could easily find out the real intention of those who were trying to torpedo the existing election process in the Yogam which had been in vogue for the last 47 years.
He said that the same system of elections and the conduct of annual general body meetings existed even before he took over as the general secretary.
The amendment was first introduced in 1966 when Prof PS Velayudhan was the general secretary. All the previous elections were conducted on the basis of the bylaw amendments and as per the orders issued by the Union Company Affairs Ministry, Company Law Board and various courts. It was the Central Government which ordered one representative vote for 100 members when there were a total of 60,000 members. Later, in 1999, it was made one vote for 200 members, Vellappalli said.
No one has questioned this system even for once during all these years. The Yogam has got more than seven lakh permanent members now. Almost 9,900 members representing them are eligible for voting, he added.
