State Election Commissioner Ramesh Kumar has sent an e-mail to the AP Assembly saying that he won’t come under the purview of the House privileges. Hence, he does not need to reply to the privileges notice issued by Minister Peddireddy Ramachandra Reddy. However, if the Assembly Secretary insisted on his reply, Ramesh Kumar has offered to give his reply not immediately but at an appropriate time in future.

Ramesh Kumar further told the Assembly Secretary that he had high esteem for the House. At the same time, he said that he got Coronavirus vaccination and the doctors advised him not to take up any tours for a few days. This was why he had also cancelled his visit to Rameswaram on LTC.

Now, it became clear that Ramesh Kumar would not be available to go ahead with the MPTC, ZPTC elections. Interestingly, he used the same excuse that the Chief Minister has used to ensure early conduct of the parishad polls. CM Jagan has earlier asked the officials to hasten the parishad polls since the coming Covid restrictions and red zones would make it difficult for the voters to take part in the polling process.

Meanwhile, the YCP MLAs have reacted sharply threatening that the SEC would have to face action from the Assembly for his non-cooperation.