SC refuses to hear plea of Congress against 8 Goa MLAs who defected to BJP

The Supreme Court on Friday refused to entertain a plea challenging a decision of the Goa assembly speaker rejecting a disqualification petition of the Congress against eight of its MLAs who defected to the ruling BJP in 2022.

Observing “it will not become the court of first appeal”, a bench comprising Chief Justice Sanjiv Khanna and Justice Sanjay Kumar asked Congress leader and petitioner Girish Chodankar to move the Goa bench of the Bombay High Court and challenge the speaker’s decision.

Senior advocate Abhishek Manu Singhvi, appearing for Chodankar, said Goa assembly speaker Ramesh Tawadkar took 720 days in deciding the plea for disqualification of the Congress MLAs owing to their defection.

During the earlier term of the assembly, the speaker took 622 days in deciding a similar plea following the defection of Congress MLAs.

The delayed decisions on the part of the speaker render such pleas for disqualification infructuous as the term of assembly expires, the senior lawyer argued.

“You have come against the order of the speaker under Article 136, how can that be?… you have to file a writ (petition in the high court),” the CJI said.

“We cannot entertain an Article 136 plea. We will not become the court of first appeal,” the bench said.

Singhvi subsequently withdrew the plea. The bench said it would be open for the Congress party leader to seek an early disposal of the plea in the high court.

On November 1, Tawadkar dismissed the disqualification petition filed by the Congress against eight of its MLAs who defected to the BJP.

The disqualification petition was filed by former Goa Congress chief Chodankar against MLAs Digambar Kamat, Aleixo Sequeira, Sankalp Amonkar, Michael Lobo, Delilah Lobo, Kedar Naik, Rudolf Fernandes and Rajesh Faldesai.

His petition sought the speaker to disqualify the eight MLAs under para 2 of the tenth schedule read with Article 191 of the Constitution on the ground they had voluntarily given up the membership of the original party (Congress) on whose tickets they contested for the 8th Goa legislative assembly and won.

In his plea to the speaker, Chodankar said there was no valid merger of the original political party in this case.

Dismissing Chodankar’s petition, speaker Tawadkar ruled that “upon the merger of the original political party of the elected member with another political party, the elected member will not face disqualification in either contingency, i.e., whether he chooses to go with the merger or disagrees with the same”.

“It is an undisputed fact that respondents were duly elected as the members of Indian National Congress for the present assembly and are now affiliated to the Bharatiya Janata Party,” Chodankar had said.

The petition before the speaker contended there was no valid merger in this case as the twin requirement of merger of political parties to be agreed by two-third of members of the legislature party was not satisfied.

The eight MLAs, however, said the speaker, through a communication on September 14, 2022, recorded the eight MLAs passed a resolution to merge the Congress legislature party with the BJP.

“In simple words, upon the merger of the original political party of the elected member with another political party, the elected member will not face disqualification in either contingency, i.e., whether he chooses to go with the merger or disagrees with the same,” the speaker ruled.

Disqualification on grounds of defection does not apply in case of merger, he said.