Uttarakhand Panchayat Election 2025: Village Governance Stalls As Thousands Of Panchayat Posts Remain Vacant

Even though an oath-taking ceremony was held on Wednesday for newly elected village leaders, the process of forming village councils across the state is still incomplete.

In 12 districts of the state (excluding Haridwar), a staggering 4,843 village councils could not be officially formed. The main reason for this is a huge number of vacant positions: 33,056 seats for village council members and 20 posts for village heads (Pradhans) are still empty.

These thousands of councils can now only be formed after by-elections are held to fill these vacant spots.

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The Legal Hurdle

After the recent village elections, the swearing-in ceremony was held for the winners. However, out of a total of 7,499 village councils in these districts, only 2,646 could be successfully established.

The problem lies in a specific rule: for a village council to be legally formed, it must have a village head and at least two-thirds of its members elected. Most of the councils that are on hold do not have enough elected members to meet this two-thirds requirement. In 20 villages, even the head could not be elected.

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Manoj Kumar Tiwari, the Deputy Director of the Panchayati Raj Department, explained the situation. "A village council is only considered valid when, along with the head, at least two-thirds of its members have been elected," he said.

He added that the State Election Commission will now be formally informed about all the vacant posts so that the process for holding by-elections can begin.