SC asks T'gana speaker to decide in 3 months on disqualification of 10 BRS MLAs

The Supreme Court on Thursday gave Telangana legislative assembly Speaker three months to decide on the disqualification of 10 MLAs who had defected to the Congress party after their election on Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) tickets. A division bench headed by Chief Justice of India (CJI) BR Gavai passed the ruling on pleas filed by BRS leaders and a BJP leader who sought a directive to the Speaker for timely action on these disqualification proceedings.

The court also set aside a November 2024 decision of a Telangana High Court division bench, which had quashed a single-judge's previous ultimatum to the Speaker to either fix a schedule for deciding the matter or possibly face adverse orders from the court.

In a related development, the SC also recommended to the Parliament to reconsider the provisions of the Constitution's Tenth Schedule, which entrust the Speaker of the house with the task of deciding a legislator's disqualification on the ground of defection. "Though we do not possess any advisory jurisdiction, it is for the Parliament to consider whether the mechanism of entrusting the speaker/chairman with the important task of deciding the issue of disqualification on the ground of defection is serving the purpose of effectively combating political defections or not," the bench said in its order."If the very foundation of our democracy and the principles that sustain it are to be safeguarded, it is to be examined whether the present mechanism is sufficient or not. At the cost of repetition, we observe that it is for the Parliament to take a call on that," it added.


The bench disapproved of the delay caused by the Telangana Speaker in deciding the disqualification petitions against BRS MLAs who defected to Congress and urged the Parliament to revisit these provisions. The court observed that the Constitution 52nd Amendment, which added the Tenth Schedule to the Constitution, made the Speaker the deciding authority with the objective of ensuring that the disqualification petitions wouldn't face the procedural delays in regular courts. So, if the speakers are keeping the matters pending, it would frustrate the objective of the Tenth Schedule, it said.