A five-judge constitution bench of the Supreme Court on Wednesday said it will hear on September 27 a plea by the Uddhav Thackeray-led faction seeking to prevent the Election Commission from deciding Maharashtra Chief Minister Eknath Shinde’s claim against the Uddhav Thackeray-led group. the “original” Shiv Sena party.
The bench, headed by Justice DY Chandrachud, said it would pass directions giving a timeline for hearing all other issues arising from a series of petitions filed by both parties regarding the powers of the Speaker/Deputy Speaker and the Governor in connection with the political crisis that has taken place. in Maharashtra a few months ago. The bench was hearing pending cases related to the crisis that led to the fall of the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) government in the state.
When the matter was taken up for hearing, senior advocate Neeraj Kishan Kaul, appearing for the Shinde faction, told a bench comprising Justices MR Shah, Krishna Murari, Hima Kohli and PS Narasimha that the opposite side had filed an intervention application in their matter. trying to prevent the jury from reaching any decision.
He said the Election Commission of India (ECI) cannot be stopped from taking any decision and earlier the apex court refused to stay the proceedings before the poll panel. Senior advocate Kapil Sibal, appearing for the Uddhav Thackeray faction, said on August 3 that the apex court had verbally asked the ECI not to take any expedited action. Appearing for the ECI, senior advocate Arvind Datar said it is a process where when there is a complaint under the symbol order, the polling panel has no option but to issue a notice to the other party.
“We have given notice to the other side in this case as well,” he said, adding that the records were voluminous and it would be appropriate if the proceedings continued. Datar said that even if the legislators are disqualified, they will remain members of the party. Sibal said the disqualification will occur under the 10th schedule if the legislator voluntarily gives up his membership of the party and not the legislature. Justice Shah asked counsel to reserve energy for the September 27 hearing.
On 23 August, the apex court referred a five-judge bench on petitions filed by the Uddhav Thackeray-led faction and the Eknath Shinde-led faction raising several constitutional issues related to defection, merger and disqualification. It asked the ECI not to issue any orders on Shinde’s faction’s plea to be considered a “genuine” Shiv Sena party and grant it a token vote.
The bench, headed by the then Chief Justice N.V. Ramana, said the series of petitions raised important constitutional questions relating to Article 10 of the Constitution relating to disqualification, powers of the Speaker and the Governor and judicial review. The Supreme Court said that the draft law laid down by the Constitution Bench in the Nabam Rebia case relating to the 10th Schedule rests on a contradictory rationale which requires filling a loophole to preserve constitutional morality.
The Supreme Court asked the Constitutional Court to deal with the constitutional questions of whether a notice of removal of a speaker restricts him from continuing with disqualification proceedings, whether a motion under Article 32 or 226 is against the disqualification proceedings, the court can decide that a member is deemed to be a disqualified member by his actions, what is the status of the proceedings in the house in the proceedings on disqualification motions against the members.
The Tenth Schedule of the Constitution provides for the prevention of defection of elected and nominated members from their political parties and contains strict anti-defection provisions. The Uddhav Thackeray faction of the Shiv Sena had earlier said that party MLAs loyal to Maharashtra Chief Minister Eknath Shinde can save themselves from disqualification under the 10th Schedule of the Constitution only by joining another political party. It asked the Shinde faction to rework the legal issues of partition, merger, defection and disqualification raised in the petitions filed by the Thackeray camp to be considered after the political crisis in Maharashtra. The Shinde group said the anti-defection law is not a weapon for a leader who has lost faith in his own party to lock in his members and somehow stay.
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