The Supreme Court on Tuesday directed that counting of votes in Haryana be done on February 27 instead of February 23.
A three-judge bench headed by Chief Justice RC Lahoti said that the counting of votes in the election held for Haryana legislative assembly will be held on February 27 as scheduled earlier.
The Election Commission had preponed the counting date to February 23.
The apex court said that counting of votes for the Haryana Assembly elections could not be taken up before receiving the postal ballots.
It also noted that the Election Commission had preponed the counting date only because of convenience and not because of any extraordinary situation.
It said the Election Commission has no serious objection to take up the counting of votes as well as the postal ballots together on February 27, the earlier scheduled date.
The court, however, made it clear that this order would not in any way reflect on the powers of the Election Commission to prepone a scheduled date of counting of votes in view of exigencies in other cases.