India, Dec. 2 -- Over a 100 petitions have been filed in the Bombay High Court against the state government's recent delimitation exercise and its method of rotating reserved seats in local bodies. Petitioners say the state's approach goes against constitutional principles of local autonomy. The court will hear the matter today.

The petitions, filed by elected representatives, former councillors and voters from several districts, claimed that the state has violated the constitutional principle of local-body governance by changing the ongoing rotation cycle for Scheduled Caste (SC) and Scheduled Tribe (ST) seats.

In Maharashtra, reservation for SC, ST and Other Backward Classes (OBC) in Zilla Parishad and Panchayat Samiti elections has h...