6 disqualified Himachal Congress MLAs shifted to Delhi from Rishikesh
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TNR Desk
The six disqualified Himachal Pradesh Congress MLAs have again been relocated from Rishikesh in Uttarakhand to New Delhi where they have been fighting a legal battle in the Supreme Court against their disqualification from the Vidhan Sabha by Speaker Kuldeep Singh Pathania on February 29 (2024).
Sources said the MLAs were moved to Delhi late on Tuesday as a precautionary measure should their presence be sought in the apex court in the case they have filed against the Speaker’s decision. The rebel MLAs have been provided protection by the CRPF.
The six rebel Congress MLAs — Sudhir Sharma (Dharamshala), Rajinder Rana (Sujanpur), Davinder Kumar Bhutto (Kutlehar), Ravi Thakur (Lahaul-Spiti), ID Lakhanpal (Barsar) and Chaitanya Sharma (Gagret) — along with Independent MLAs KL Thakur, Hoshiar Singh and Ashish Sharma had reached Rishikesh on March 8. They had landed at Dehradun airport in Jolly Grant via a chartered plane and proceeded to a luxury hotel located about 30 km from Rishikesh.
The case pertaining to the disqualification was heard in the Supreme Court on Tuesday (March 12) and was deferred to March 18. The case was heard by a three-judge bench comprising Justice Sanjiv Khanna, Justice Dipankar Dutta and Justice Prashant Kumar Mishra.
Senior BJP leader and former MP from Chandigarh Satya Pal Jain had represented the rebel MLAs in the absence of leading lawyer Harish Salve, who was said to be in London. At the outset, Jain had sought an adjournment saying they were being “led by Salve who was unable to join today”.
Justice Khanna asked Jain why couldn’t they move the Himachal Pradesh High Court. “What’s the fundamental right (violation),” asked Justice Khanna. As Jain replied “we have been elected”, Justice Khanna said “that’s not a fundamental right”.
Jain said it was a rare case where the MLAs had been disqualified from the Vidhan Sabha in a short gap of 18 hours. Justice Khanna said, “That’s disputed by them (Himachal government). Alright, we will hear it on Monday.”
Details accessed by The Newz Radar from the Supreme Court website showed the case (WPC No. 156/2024) was listed at serial number 36. The petitioner is Chaitanya Sharma (disqualified Congress MLA from Gagret) while the respondent is the Himachal Pradesh Legislative Assembly Speaker. The advocate on record for Chaitanya is Mrinal Gopal Elker and for the Himachal government, which has filed a caveat, are VKC Law Offices and Nishanth Patil.
The Assembly Speaker had disqualified these MLAs based on their absence during the budget session in the Assembly. The MLAs have deemed the Speaker’s decision incorrect and have demanded its revocation.
The rebel MLAs were initially holed up in a Panchkula hotel and then relocated to Rishikesh. BJP MLAs Bikram Thakur and Trilok Jamwal had also been residing at the same hotel in Uttarakhand.
The Himachal Pradesh Congress has been embroiled in an internal turmoil following the Rajya Sabha election debacle. The Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu government had to face an embarrassing situation when party’s Rajya Sabha nominee Abhishek Manu Singhvi, a renowned lawyer, faced defeat despite the Congress having comfortable majority with 40 MLAs in the 68-member Vidhan Sabha.
The BJP had 25 MLAs of its own but it managed the votes of the six Congress rebels and three Independent MLAs. BJP’s Harsh Mahajan won after a draw of lots as both the candidates were tied at 34 votes each.
