Chandigarh, Feb. 19 -- The Punjab and Haryana high court on Wednesday extended its order regarding the process of civic body elections for nine municipal corporations and around 100 municipal councils and municipal committees in the state till March 18. Earlier this month, the court had ordered that the state would not take any "precipitate action" in respect of the poll process, which effectively meant a stay on the poll exercise. The order was extended while hearing a batch of petitions filed from various districts challenging the delimitation of wards. A copy of the order is awaited. Lawyers associated with the case, including SPS Tinna, confirmed the development. Reports had earlier suggested that the polls could be held in February-March this year. The petitions were initially filed challenging the delimitation exercise in Abohar, Fazilka and Pathankot. Subsequently, similar petitions were filed from several other districts. The petitioners argued that any delimitation exercise initiated or finalised after December 31 can't be done in view of the Centre's August 2025 notification, which is a pan-India direction barring any changes to boundaries of towns, districts and wards in view of preparations for the census 2027. However, the chief secretary on Wednesday told the court that the administrative boundaries cannot be frozen prior to one year from the Census reference date intimated by the Census commissioner. Thus, Census reference date constitutes the "foundational benchmark" for determining the permissible date of freezing of administrative boundaries. The affidavit by the CS says as per registrar general of India notification of June 16, 2025, the said date has been fixed for March 1, 2027. It means that administrative boundaries cannot be frozen prior to February 28, 2026....