TNR Desk
The six rebel Himachal Pradesh Congress MLAs who have moved the Supreme Court against their disqualification from the Assembly by Speaker Kuldeep Singh Pathania are being represented by senior advocate Harish Salve, who is among the country’s most-successful and top-paid lawyers.
Salve served as the Solicitor General of India from November 1, 1999, to November 3, 2002. He represented Kulbhushan Jadhav in the International Court of Justice (ICJ). On January 16, 2020, he was appointed as a King’s Counsel for the courts of England and Wales. Among his distinguished clients are the Tata Group, ITC Limited and Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Industries Limited.
Salve, however, could not appear in the Supreme Court on Tuesday (March 12, 2024) when a three-judge bench, comprising Justice Sanjiv Khanna, Justice Dipankar Dutta and Justice Prashant Kumar Mishra, heard the case pertaining to the disqualification of the Congress MLAs. The case has now been deferred for next Monday (March 18).
In Salve’s absence, senior BJP leader and former Chandigarh MP Satya Pal Jain represented the rebel MLAs in the apex court. At the outset, Jain 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,” 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 within 18 hours, the MLAs had been disqualified from the Vidhan Sabha. 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.
Congress rebel Chaitanya Sharma, supported by other disqualified MLAs Sudhir Sharma, Rajinder Rana, Inder Dutt Lakhanpal, Ravi Thakur and Davinder Bhutto, have filed the petition challenging disqualification from the Vidhan Sabha by Speaker Kuldeep Singh Pathania. The Speaker took the action under the anti-defection law as the six MLAs allegedly violated the Congress whip for voting for the passage of the budget in the Assembly.
The rebel MLAs have contested the decision to disqualify them by the Speaker and have sought relief from the apex court. 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 a private hotel at Rishikesh in Uttarakhand. Apart from the six Congress rebels, three Independent legislators and two BJP MLAs, Bikram Thakur and Trilok Jamwal, have also been residing at the same hotel.
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 legal luminary, 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.
