Goemkarponn Desk
PANAJI: The High Court of Bombay at Goa has reserved the order on disqualification petition filed against 12 ex and incumbent MLA’s by Goa Congress and MGP. The final arguments have been concluded in the case.
The petitioner has stated that the interpretation given by the Speaker in his impugned disqualification order is contrary to the aims and objectives of the Tenth Schedule of the Constitution of India, that is, prevention of defection and it defeats the very purpose the Schedule which was enacted in the year 1985 and thereafter strengthened by amendment in the year 2003.
Chief Justice of the Bombay High Court Dipankar Datta had recently constituted a two-member Bench comprising Justice K K Tated and Justice Prithiviraj Chavan to hear the appeal, after Justice Mahesh Sonak recused himself from hearing the matter claiming that he had appeared ‘for some of the respondents earlier’.
The 10 MLAs, the submission states, in their response to the disqualification petition did not plead that there was a merger of original political party and therefore there was no question of any valid merger in terms of para 4 of Tenth schedule of the Constitution.
On April 20 this year, Speaker Rajesh Patnekar had dismissed two disqualification petitions filed by Congress president Girish Chodankar and MGP MLA Sudin Dhavalikar against their party MLAs for switching sides and joining the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in 2019.
