Gandhinagar: The Gujarat High Court has junked opposition Congress party’ plea against state election commission’s decision of counting votes for first phase of civic polls even before voting starts for the second phase of the election. Congress had challenged the election commission decision on the ground that result may influence the second phase. While first phase polls is going to cover the Municipal Corporation elections of six cities, the second phase would involve municipalities, taluka and district panchayat elections. A bench headed by Justice JB Pardiwala observed, “It is possible, and to a certain extent quiet obvious, that the result of one part of the election may have its own influence on the second part of the election, but that by itself would not be sufficient to say that the election is not free and fair.” Congress party has meanwhile geared up to challenge the State high court order in the Supreme Court. On previous occasion, in same petition, the Supreme Court had ordered single day counting for two-phase local polls. However this time, the situation has Covid-19 pandemic background. In reply to a related question, Deputy Chief Minister Nitin Patel said that the Gujarat High Court has considered positively the State Election Commission’s argument related to pandemic situation and need of two dates of counting due to health related concerns of electoral/counting staff. DeshGujarat