Group defections a betrayal of voters: PIL in HC

A public interest litigation has been filed in the Bombay high court seeking a declaration that legislators defecting from their party should not be allowed to participate in the proceedings of the House or hold Constitutional posts until their disqualification is decided. The petitioner argues that such defections betray voters and undermine the democratic process. The PIL challenges the Constitutional validity of the anti-defection law and highlights the need for a time limit for deciding motions for disqualification.

MUMBAI: A public interest litigation has been filed in the Bombay high court seeking a declaration that legislators or groups of legislators defecting from the original political party should not be entitled to participate in the proceedings of the House or to hold any Constitutional posts until the issue relating to their disqualification is decided.

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The petitioner, Meenakshi Menon, founder trustee of NGO Vanashakti, has claimed that unabated group defections by politicians are a betrayal of voters, who vote for political ideologies and manifestos. “This is leading to further alienation of the general public to the process of elections wherein thousands of crores of taxpayers money are spent without any accountability. That kind of public perception and simmering feeling is detrimental to the very democratic process which is part of the basic structure of the Constitution,” the PIL stated.

Advocates Ahmed Abdi and Eknath Dhokale on Monday mentioned the PIL before a division bench of chief justice DK Upadhyaya and justice Arif Doctor. In the PIL, Menon said that she approached the high court in the backdrop of the political crisis in Maharashtra that started in June 2022 when current chief minister Eknath Shinde and a number of MLAs rebelled against then chief minister Uddhav Thackeray, leading to the fall of the MVA government. Deputy chief minister Ajit Pawar’s recent rebellion against his uncle and NCP chief Sharad Pawar has a lot of similarities with Shinde’s rebellion, she added.

Menon has challenged the Constitutional validity of Para 4 of the Tenth Schedule of the Constitution, contending that it has left a window for defection in the name of merger by a two/third majority of the members of the house. She contends that the paragraph contravenes the very objective of the anti-defection law contained in the Tenth Schedule.

Stating that an amount of $9 billion was spent on the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, Menon in her petition stated that “this amount of money spent on elections does more damage than just being a financial burden. Excessive money spent on campaigning is a harbinger of bad governance.”

Highlighting the need for a declaration, she has stated that the law (Tenth Schedule) does not provide a time limit for deciding motions for disqualification of defected legislators. “With the role of the Speaker of the House getting more and more political, disqualifications are either decided immediately or kept pending indefinitely, depending on which of the two suited the political party that the Speaker is affiliated with.”

“In case of split and merger with any other political party (as permissible under the present law) the voter is taken for granted,” the PIL stated, adding “The voters have no recourse in law to take action against the legislator who is part of the group which has decided to split and merge with any other political party.”