Supreme Court to hear appeals of AAP govt against HC order on LG's powers

NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court today agreed to hear on September 9 a batch of six appeals filed by Arvind Kejriwal-led AAP govt, challenging Delhi High Court verdict that the Lieutenant Governor is the administrative head of the national capital.

"Let them come up for hearing on Friday," a bench of Chief Justice T S Thakur and Justice D Y Chandrachud said when senior advocate Gopal Subramaniam, appearing for Delhi government, sought an urgent hearing of these petitions.

"A piquant situation has emerged in Delhi due to the Delhi High Court's August 4 judgement which had held that all decisions of the elected government have to get prior approval of the Lt Governor," Subramaniam said.

On September 2, the Delhi government had informed Supreme Court that it has filed six different pleas challenging the Delhi HC order and withdrew its civil suit on declaring the national capital as a full State.

The court had allowed the AAP government to withdraw the civil suit and given the liberty to raise the issues raised in it in the Special Leave Petitions (SLPs) it has filed.

The apex court had last month asked the AAP government whether it would file an appeal against the HC order holding Delhi as a Union Territory with LG as its administrative head and, if yes, by when.

It had said the Delhi government needed to file the SLP and the civil suit would become "infructuous".

Centre had vehemently opposed the government's plea, saying that it cannot pursue parallel recourse for the same relief.

Earlier, the high court had held that Delhi will continue to remain a Union territory under the Constitution with the LG as its administrative head.