The Supreme Court on Monday declined to stay the disqualification order issued by the Himachal Pradesh assembly speaker Kuldeep Singh Pathania against six Congress rebels. The Congress MLAs had engaged in cross-voting during the recent Rajya Sabha elections in the state.
A bench of Justice Sanjiv Khanna and Justice Dipankar Datta issued a notice to the office of the Himachal Pradesh Assembly Speaker and sought its response to the plea within four weeks.
The bench remarked that on the question of by-election on six vacant seats, they will have to examine whether the elections which have been notified by the Election Commission of India are to be stayed during the pendency of plea.
The bench also observed that until a decision is reached on the plea, the rebel Congress MLAs will not be permitted to vote or partake in Assembly proceedings. The top court ruled that MLAs will not be allowed to vote but no fresh elections are called. The case has been scheduled for listing on May 6, with the rebel MLAs given a week to file their rejoinder.
The six rebel Congress MLAs are Sudhir Sharma (Dharamshala), Ravi Thakur (Lahaul-Spiti), Rajinder Rana (Sujanpur), Inder Dutt Lakhanpal (Barsar), Chaitanya Sharma (Gagret) and Devinder Kumar (Kutlehar).
Due to the cross-voting, the 40-member Congress party lost the Rajya Sabha seat to the 25-member BJP, which was supported by only 3 independents. After the defeat, parliamentary affairs minister Harshvardhan Chauhan lodged a petition that ultimately led to the disqualification of the six members who had disobeyed the Congress whip during the budget session. Consecutively, the rebels challenged the Speaker’s decision in the apex court.
After the disqualification of the rebel Congress MLAs, the effective strength of the House was reduced from 68 to 62, with the number of Congress MLAs decreasing from 40 to 34. Senior advocate Harish Salve appeared for the MLAs and Senior advocate Kapil Sibal and Dr Singhvi appeared for the Speaker.