No relief for disqualified Himachal rebels

Speaker Kuldeep Singh Pathania said he received a complaint from parliamentary affairs minister Harshwardhan Chauhan against six MLAs under the anti-defection law

 The Supreme Court on Monday refused to stay the order of Himachal Pradesh speaker Kuldeep Singh Pathania disqualifying six rebel Congress MLAs, who had cross-voted for the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) during the Rajya Sabha election and later defied the party whip during voting for the finance bill.

The six rebel Congress MLAs had cross-voted for the BJP (ANI)

A bench headed by justice Sanjiv Khanna also issued a notice to the speaker and sought its response within four weeks on a petition challenging the legislators’ disqualification. It also said that it will decide in May whether fresh bypolls in the six seats, as scheduled by the Election Commission of India (ECI) for June 1, needs to be stayed.

“We will issue notice but we are sure, we cannot stay the disqualification as they (petitioners) will not be allowed to vote or participate in the House proceedings,” the bench, also comprising justice Dipankar Datta, said.

“We are on the second part whether there should be stay on fresh elections as the petition will then become infructuous,” the bench added.

On February 29, speaker Pathania disqualified Sujanpur MLA Rajinder Rana, Dharamshala MLA Sudhir Sharma, Barsar MLA Inder Dutt Lakhanpal, Kutlehar MLA Devinder Kumar Bhutto, Lahaul and Spiti MLA Ravi Thakur and Gagret MLA Chaitanya Sharma for defying the party whip during voting for the finance bill a day before.

The disqualification order also referred to the Rajya Sabha election that was held on February 27 though no whip applies to voting for the Upper House. Pathania said it was unethical for an elected MLA of any party to vote in favour of another ideology even though a whip is not issued for Rajya Sabha elections.

Pathania said he received a complaint from parliamentary affairs minister Harshwardhan Chauhan against six MLAs under the anti-defection law.

On March 5, the rebel MLAs challenged the disqualification in the top court, saying Pathania’s order was “pre-meditated and suffers from illegality… as it was decided with a pre-determined mind”. “The respondent 2 (Pathania) has failed to appreciate the facts and law on the point and the same has been passed only to serve the purposes of his original party Congress (I) and his political bosses,” it said.

Appearing for the rebels on Monday, senior advocates Harish Salve and Maninder Singh told the top court that ECI had fixed June 1 for simultaneous elections to the six assembly seats along with the last phase of the Lok Sabha polls.

“I am entitled for a stay. If elections are held, I cannot be told that you cannot come in. My petition will become infructuous,” Salve said.

To this, the bench said: “When we issue notice, EC may itself delay. That normally happens… In view of the fresh elections, this may be an issue whether to decide the matter before the elections or we don’t allow fresh elections.”

The court also voiced concerns over the six constituencies going unrepresented. “There is no question of stay in the present as some portion of the state is remaining unrepresented in the House,” it said as it sought a response from the assembly secretary on the petition.

It also issued notices to Pathania and Chauhan and posted the matter for hearing in the week commencing May 6.

Advocate Abhishek Singhvi, who was the Congress candidate for the Rajya Sabha election, and lawyer Varun K Chopra appeared for the chief whip in the top court.

“This court may only issue notice. Once the elections are notified, Article 329 process has kicked in. There is no question that the court will stay the election process. There is also no question of stay of disqualification,” the lawyers said.

Senior advocate Kapil Sibal, who represented the state assembly, pointed out that the speaker was named individually by the petitioners. “They have named speaker in person. The court may direct the response to be filed by the legislative secretary of the assembly,” he said.

The disqualified MLAs opposed Sibal’s request, alleging “malafides” against the speaker.

The court, however, permitted Sibal’s request as it ordered submission of responses within four weeks and the petitioners’ reply to it within one week.

Senior advocate SP Jain, who appeared for the petitioners, told the court that though the poll body has announced the schedule for fresh elections in the six seats, the process of filing nomination is still far off on May 7. He requested the court to decide on the matter before May 7.The bench refused to change its earlier date.

On March 12, the bench had asked the disqualified Congress legislators to list the ground on which they filed their petition in the top court without approaching the high court citing a violation of their fundamental rights.