Team Herald
PANJIM: Dominic John Noronha of Sirlim has filed a writ petition before the High Court of Bombay at Goa, challenging the Goa Assembly Speaker, Ramesh Tawadkar’s, decision to dismiss his disqualification petition against eight rebel Congress MLAs who defected from the Congress to the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in September 2022.
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In his petition, Noronha has requested that the Speaker’s order, dated October 14, 2022, be quashed and set aside, claiming that the eight MLAs—namely, Digambar Kamat, Aleixo Sequeira, Sankalp Amonkar, Michael Lobo, Delilah Lobo, Kedar Naik, Rudolfo Fernandes and Rajesh Faldessai — had incurred disqualification under the Tenth Schedule of the Constitution of India and had thereby ceased to be members of the Goa Legislative Assembly, effective from September 14, 2022.
Noronha had argued that the Speaker’s finding that the respondents have not incurred disqualification under the Tenth Schedule of the Constitution is arbitrary, unreasonable, contrary to law and unconstitutional, as it was based on a complete misreading, misconstruction and misinterpretation of Paragraph 4 of the Tenth Schedule of the Constitution.
According to Noronha, the Speaker erred in rejecting his case regarding the twin requirements: firstly, the merger of the political party, and secondly, that no fewer than two-thirds of the legislature party members agree to such a merger.
Noronha contends that the Speaker incorrectly held that there was no requirement for the merger of the political party and failed to recognise the mandatory twin requirements for a merger under Paragraph 4 of the Tenth Schedule of the Constitution. The Speaker arbitrarily concluded that Paragraph 4 carves out an exception, stipulating that the disqualification prescribed in Paragraph 2 does not apply in the case of a merger of political parties by providing a deeming fiction.
The Speaker, according to Noronha, misconstrued and misinterpreted the provisions of Paragraph 4 of the Tenth Schedule in concluding that if the twin requirements of a merger of the political party and of the legislature party were mandatory, then sub-paragraph 2 of Paragraph 4 would be rendered redundant.
Noronha asserted that the Speaker should have ruled that the deeming fiction under sub-paragraph 2 of Paragraph 4 of the Tenth Schedule applies only when there is a merger of the political party, followed by two-thirds of the legislature party members agreeing to such a merger.
Additionally, Noronha argued that the Speaker further erred by relying on the judgment of the High Court of Bombay at Goa in the case of Girish Chodankar v. The Speaker and 10 Others in February 2022, which held that a decision by the political party to merge was not required for the deeming fiction in sub-paragraph 2 of Paragraph 4 under the Tenth Schedule to apply.
Meanwhile, a special leave petition (SLP) filed by former Congress president Girish Chodankar, requesting that Speaker Ramesh Tawadkar be directed to decide on his disqualification petition within a specified timeframe, is expected to come up for hearing before the Supreme Court on November 5.
