SC disposes Congress lawmaker's plea on disqualification proceedings against MLAs in MP

New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Wednesday agreed to give priority to disqualification cases filed before it after a complaint by senior advocate Kapil Sibal, while withdrawing a case relating to the defection of some Congress MLAs who joined the BJP government of Shivraj Singh Chouhan in Madhya Pardesh.

The Congress had filed a petition in the top court seeking the disqualification of these MLAs on the grounds that the Speaker had failed to act against them. Under a recent interpretation to the anti-defection laws, law-makers can only be disqualified till they are re-elected again to the House and not for the rest of the term of the House.

The need to disqualify them was obviated by the recent bypolls to 28 seats in MP.


Sibal took this opportunity to express his pain and anguish over the delay in hearing such cases by the top court. Under the law, a Speaker has to take a call on any disqualification plea within three months. But this is rarely done, prompting the affected parties to approach the court.

The Opposition Congress has in fact approached the court multiple times in recent years. But most of these cases are pending. This is similar in the Goa case, where the BJP had wooed and got several Congress and MGP MLAs to its side after the 2017 polls.

The case has been pending for over a year in the top court now.

So also with the Tamil Nadu case. A disqualification petition filed in the top court regarding 11 MLAs who had voted against CM Edapaddi K Palaniswami has been pending for over three years now.

The Congress has moved repeated applications in the top court for an early hearing in the Goa case, but to no avail. “Some kind of urgency may be shown in hearing these cases,” Sibal argued before bench led by the CJI.

The CJI was quick to shrug off any responsibility for this. “We will not take the blame for this,” the CJI said, instead blaming the parties for taking repeated adjournments in the case. Sibal said he had never taken any adjournments and sought priority for such cases.

“We will not grant any adjournments,” the CJI assured him. “We will take care.”