New Delhi, Sep 14 - The Supreme Court Monday allocated election symbols to three registered but unrecognised political parties from Maharashtra including the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS), brushing aside the Election Commission's plea that the move would create practical problems for it.

A bench of Chief Justice K.G. Balakrishnan and Justice P. Sathasivam allocated 'railway engine', 'whistle' and 'coconut' as poll symbols to MNS, Bahujan Agadi and Jansurya Shakti for the Oct 13 assembly elections.

The bench brushed aside Election Commission counsel Menakshi Arora's contention that unregulated allotment of symbols would greatly upset the poll panel's scheme on the issue as it has only around 70 symbols available for allocation, while the number of registered and unrecognised political parties in a state can run into hundreds.

The commission cannot afford to allocate a separate poll symbol for every unrecognised political party, argued Arora, adding that only recognised national and state-level parties are entitled to have an exclusive, common and definite symbol.

The Election Symbols (Reservation and Allotment) Order stipulates that a political outfit would be recognised as a state-level party only if it has secured at least six percent of the total votes polled in the state besides winning at least two seats in the previous assembly elections or one seat in the Lok Sabha in the previous general elections.

A party, recognised as state-level party in at least four states is known as national party, said Arora.

She sought to impress upon the bench that a political party is given a separate poll symbol throughout the state only after it has proved its political mettle to some extent in previous elections by winning a certain percentage of votes.