SC to hear plea to suspend 6 BSP MLAs from Rajasthan Assembly on August 11

SC to take up matter along with transfer plea by six MLAs

The Supreme Court on Monday decided to consider on Tuesday a plea to suspend the membership of six Rajasthan Assembly MLAs who got elected on BSP ticket and subsequently merged themselves with the ruling Congress party.

A bench of Justices Arun Mishra, B R Gavai and Krishna Murari agreed to take up the petition by BJP MLA Madan Dilawar on August 11, along with a transfer petition by the six MLAs.

Dilawar sought a stay on the order of September 18, 2019, passed by Speaker C P Joshi allowing six MLAs' merger with the Congress. He also sought a direction to restrain MLAs-- Lakhan Singh, Rajender Singh Guda, Deepchand Kishangadbas, Joginder Singh Avana, Sandeep Kumar and Vajib Ali -- from voting in Assembly session beginning August 14.

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The six MLAs, for their part, have also moved the top court for transferring a plea by Dilawar from the High Court to the top court, as similar matters were pending here.

Petitioner Dilawar challenged the validity of the High Court's order of August 6, 2020. He claimed that HC had failed to appreciate that the Speaker straight away "illegally" accepted the request of six MLAs and allowed the so-called merger of their party, i.e. BSP, into the Congress, recognised it and ordered that now onwards these six MLAs will be treated as MLAs belonging to Indian National Congress.

On Monday, senior advocate Harish Salve, appearing for Dilawar, contended that his client filed a disqualification petition in March but the Speaker dismissed it. The HC issued a notice on a plea questioning the Speaker's decision.

Since six MLAs have sought transfer of the matter from the High Court to the top court, let both the petitions be considered together, Salve said.

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In his plea, Dilawar said the BSP which is a recognised national party has never merged with any at any given point of time.

The petitioner further contended that the Speaker had wrongly recorded that two-third of the legislators of any political party can merge their party into any other political party. "This is a total misreading of the provisions of law. As per para four of the Tenth Schedule of the Constitution, the condition of two-third MLAs accepting merger is a second condition, not the first. The first is that the original political party of the legislatures who are claiming merger should have merged with another political party," he pointed out.

Moreover, the Speaker had no jurisdiction to record a finding of a so-called merger, without giving notice to the Bahujan Samaj Party and without holding an enquiry as to whether the BSP has actually merged in the Congress or not, he contended.