NAGPUR, Dec. 3 -- The counting of votes for elections to the 264 municipal councils and nagar panchayats that went to the polls on Tuesday will be held on December 21, instead of December 3, following a directive from the Nagpur bench of the Bombay High Court (HC). In an interim order passed on Tuesday, HC also prohibited exit polls until half an hour after polling ends for the 24 municipal councils and nagar panchayats where elections will now be held on December 20. These bodies were also slated to vote on Tuesday, but the Maharashtra State Election Commission (SEC) postponed the elections on Saturday, citing irregularities in the election process. Because of this, the court said, the model code of conduct will also remain in force until December 20. The bench was hearing several petitions challenging the SEC's revised polling schedule. The petitions sought to align the vote count with the revised schedule, arguing that declaring the results on December 3 could influence voting in the December 20 elections in other constituencies. One of the petitions was related to Chandrapur district, where the SEC had halted voting in ward 7 of the Warora Municipal Council but planned to declare results for the remaining 13 wards on December 3. BJP candidate Sachin Chute said in his petition that he was informed of the amended schedule only on November 30. He urged the court to align Warora's vote counting with the statewide schedule on December 21. The high court's directive comes against the backdrop of heightened tensions surrounding the long-delayed local body elections across Maharashtra, which have been held up for over three years. While 264 municipal councils and nagar panchayats voted on Tuesday, the SEC postponed polling in 24 others due to alleged irregularities, including the timeline for withdrawing nominations and allocating election symbols. The postponement of the polls and the vote counting drew widespread criticism from leaders across the political spectrum. with chief minister Devendra calling it a "systemic failure". "The ruling of the HC bench will have to be accepted by everybody, but the mess created by the SEC is unprecedented. I have never witnessed this in my 30-plus years of political life. The bench and the SEC are autonomous, but we have been disillusioned by the failure of the system. The elections and results are being postponed, leading to massive confusion. The SEC needs to correct its act as it has to conduct many more elections in the near future," he said. Fadnavis believes the postponement was due to a misinterpretation of the law governing the conduct of the elections. "I do not know who the SEC is consulting, but everybody, including legal experts, has said the postponement was uncalled for. I have no personal grudge against the poll body, but I am upset because the legal norms are not being followed," he added....