Bombay HC at Goa dismisses petition seeking disqualification of 12 MLAs who joined BJP in 2019
India Today
Congress MLA Girish Chodankar instituted a disqualification petition seeking disqualification of the members as they had voluntarily given up membership of their original party in 2019.
The Bombay High Court at Goa on Thursday dismissed petitions seeking disqualification of 12 members of the Goa Legislative Assembly for defection from the Congress party to the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in 2019.In an 89-page judgement, the bench of Justices Manish Pitale and RN Laddha upheld the order passed by the Speaker of the Goa Legislative Assembly dismissing petitions filed for disqualification of the MLAs. The petitions were filed by Congress MLA Girish Chodankar and Maharashtrawadi Gomantak Party MLA Sudin Dhavalikar.On March 11, 2017, an election was held in Goa and the tally of elected members belonging to various political parties and independent candidates was that Congress had 17, BJP 13, Maharashtra Gomantak Party (MGP) 3, Goa Forward Party (GFP) 3, NCP 1 and there were 3 independents. In-between, there had been minor reflections and changes in the rally, but in 2019, ten members claiming to be two-thirds of the legislative party of Congress in the assembly, decided to join the BJP. The speaker, accordingly, allotted them seats along with BJP members.
READ | Maharashtra govt fully stands with Nawab Malik: Sanjay Raut on minister’s arrest by EDChodankar instituted a disqualification petition seeking disqualification of the members as they had voluntarily given up membership of their original party, Congress. After a preliminary enquiry and perusal of written statements by the members, the Speaker dismissed the petition on April 24, 2021.Meanwhile, in Dhavalikar's plea, two members of the regional party voluntarily gave up membership claiming they had merged with BJP. This grievance was raised by Dhavalikar before the Speaker, who dismissed the disqualification petition on April 20, 2021.
The Speaker observed for Chodankar's petition that since two-thirds of members of Congress decided to merge with the BJP, the deeming fiction operated as per paragraph 4(2) of the Tenth Schedule, thus saving the members from disqualification. For Dhavalikar, it was observed that since there was a deemed merger of the political party MGP with the BJP, no disqualification could happen.The petitioners challenged the orders in the High Court, raising the question of political morality and whether the orders passed by the Speaker are in furtherance of the object with which the Tenth Schedule was introduced in the Constitution. The Tenth Schedule was a law brought in to limit the frequent defections of members of a political party to another political party.
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The bench went through various Apex Court rulings and said, "The Supreme Court held that it was for the legislature to lay down the threshold of political morality while introducing the Tenth Schedule for addressing the evil of unprincipled defections by elected members of political parties. It was held that the Courts would have nothing else to go by, except the legislative wisdom in this arena. The perception of the legislature regarding political proprieties and moral standards was recognized by the Supreme Court while emphasizing that there was a need to provide for “floor-crossing” based on honest dissent."
