Team Herald
PANJIM: While seeking two weeks time to file an additional affidavit in the disqualification petition, Goa Legislative Assembly Speaker Rajesh Patnekar informed the Supreme Court that the information and documents required could not be completed on account of the COVID-19 situation in the State.
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Hearing in the disqualification petitions filed against ten MLAs by State Congress president Girish Chodankar, along with two former MGP MLAs filed by Ramkrishna (Sudin) Dhavalikar, all who joined BJP, is tentatively scheduled in the Supreme Court on Tuesday.
Adv Anannya Ghosh, representing the Speaker in the Apex Court, has moved an application, requesting that the hearing be adjourned by a period of two weeks.
“The respondent is in process of filing an additional affidavit to bring on record certain further information and documents, which would have a bearing on the present dispute, which could not be done on account of the COVID-19 situation in Goa,” the application states.
During the last hearing held on July 23, the Speaker had informed the Court that due to the COVID-19 outbreak-enforced lockdown and the worsening situation thereafter, no hearing was conducted in the disqualification petition filed against ten MLAs who had defected from the Congress.
The petitioners, in both matters, had contended that the Speaker has violated the deadline of three months to decide on a disqualification petition, which has been set by the Supreme Court in a ruling pertaining to a Manipur MLA’s defection issue.
The Apex Court had issued notice to the Speaker and 10 MLAs who had defected from the Congress in the disqualification petition filed by Chodankar, while the petition against two MLAs who had defected from MGP was admitted, last month, under the anti-defection law.
The petitioners have maintained that the MLAs have incurred disqualification under Article 191(2) of the Constitution read with para 2 of the Tenth Schedule and are liable to be disqualified as Members of the Legislative Assembly.
