Team Herald
NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Tuesday adjourned to April 22 two disqualification cases against 12 MLAs of Goa who had defected to the Bhartiya Janata Party in 2019. Speaker Rajesh Patnekar, who had earlier fixed his order for April 29, will now deliver the order on the disqualifications on April 20.
The next hearing is crucial as it comes just a day before the retirement of Chief Justice Sharad Arvind Bobde heading the Bench that also comprises Justices A S Bopanna and V Ramasubramanian.
During the hearing, on being told that the Speaker has reserved his order for April 29, the Chief Justice said it is not acceptable since he won’t be there after April 23 to preside over the Bench as he is superannuating. He directed the Speaker to pass orders on April 20.
Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, appearing for the Speaker, said he had instructions from the Speaker that he would pass the orders on April 20. He responded when the CJI asked Mehta whether the issue be heard all over again by a new Bench after he demits the office.
The Bench asked the Solicitor General to seeks instructions once again from the Speaker to pass orders on April 20.
Senior advocate Kapil Sibal, appearing for Chodankar, said, “This is a mockery of the whole procedure as the top court had on February 10 recorded a statement that the Speaker will dispose of the pleas by February 26, but till now the order has been reserved and the verdict not pronounced.” He said that the matter cannot be argued on merits, if the order is not passed by the Speaker.
The first petition is by Goa Congress president Girish Chodankar against 10 party MLAs who defected to the BJP and many became ministers while the second is by Ramakrishna (Sudin) Dhavalikar of the Maharashtrawadi Gomantak Party (MGP) against two MLAs who are now ministers in the BJP government.
Both petitions are against Speaker Patnekar not giving any decision on their pleas to disqualify the defector MLAs under the anti-defection law.
The Speaker held separate meetings with both the petitioners in Panjim on Monday, a day ahead of the Supreme Court hearing, and had fixed April 29 as the date for orders on their disqualification petitions.
It may be recalled that the Congress leader had last month urged the apex court to direct the Speaker to decide his plea seeking disqualification of these 10 MLAs.
He had said that a disqualification petition was filed in August 2019 and one-and-half year has gone by but a decision has not been taken on it.
Chodankar said he had filed the disqualification petition on August 8, 2019 before the Speaker and had contended that these MLAs “had ex-facie incurred disqualification under Article 191(2) of the Constitution, read with para 2 of the Tenth Schedule, and are liable to be disqualified as member of the Assembly”.
The petitioner has said the matter was heard on February 13, 2020 but he has neither received any communication from the office of Speaker nor has he been intimated of any order being passed on the disqualification petition.
Referring to an apex court judgment, the plea said the Speaker is required to decide a petition of this nature “within a reasonable period of time, and in any case, absent exceptional circumstances, within a period of 3 months”.
