Daijiworld Media Network - Bengaluru (MS)
Bengaluru, Nov 10: The fate of the appeal submitted by the 17 disqualified MLAs of Karnataka state assembly will be decided by the Supreme Court (SC) on November 13. They were disqualified by the then speaker of the assembly Ramesh Kumar under the anti-defection law.
The last hearing on the case was held on October 25 by the three judge bench of justices Sanjiv Khanna, Krishna Murari and N V Ramana. On behalf of the Congress and JD (S), senior advocates like Devadatt Kamat, K Shashi Kiran Shetty, Rajeev Dhavan and Kapil Sibal had presented their arguments in front of the bench while senior counsel Mukul Rohatgi, V Giri, Sajan Poovayya, C A Sundaram, A K Ganguli and K V Vishwanathan appeared for the disqualified MLAs.
The disqualified MLAs had further appealed to the SC to defer the by polls of the state that are scheduled to be held on December 5 as per the notification of the Election Commission as the verdict in their case is not yet given by the court. Now the SC might not consider their appeal as it has fixed the November 13 as the date for its take on this issue.
The Election Commission had postponed the by polls, that were originally slated to be held on October 21, based on the direction of the supreme court as it said that it wants to hear the case completely and does not want to give any interim order on the matter.
The disqualified rebel MLAs of Congress and JD (S) are saying that the then speaker Ramesh Kumar went beyond his authority and used article 190 (2) (b) of the constitution to disqualify them and also not allowing them to contest elections till the end of the term of the 15th legislative assembly.
The Congress party is of the opinion that this issue should be referred to the constitution bench since it involves a substantial question of law, which will impact the political scenario of the whole nation.
In the opinion given by Rakesh Dwivedi, senior advocate representing the Election Commission, it is said that the speaker cannot prevent any MLA from being a minister or contest by polls based on the powers under the Tenth Schedule (anti-defection law).