The Supreme Court has ordered that the Congress and Janata Dal (Secular) rebel MLAs in Karnataka can't be compelled to participate in the state assembly proceedings, including a trust vote by Chief Minister HD Kumaraswamy on Thursday.
The bench headed by Chief Justice of India Ranjan Gogoi also gave Karnataka Speaker KR Ramesh Kumar liberty to decide on the MLA resignations within the time he chooses. The speaker, Supreme Court said, should not be forced to take a decision within a time frame.
The Congress-JD(S) government, which was formed last year after the election results threw up a hung assembly in Karnataka, is facing a political crisis with 15 MLAs resigning from their membership. Speaker Kumar, however, had said he was under “no obligation” to act in haste until he was convinced that the resignations were genuine and voluntary. The rebel MLAs moved the apex court seeking a direction to the speaker to accept their resignations.
Appearing for the rebel Karnataka Congress MLAs, senior advocate Mukul Rohatgi had argued that the speaker has kept the resignations pending to disqualify the legislators, making the resignations infructuous. Rohatgi requested the court to set a time frame for the speaker to decide on the resignations but he shouldn't act on the disqualification petitions against the MLAs in the meantime.
Abhishek Manu Singhvi, appearing for the Karnataka Speaker, countered Rohatgi's submissions. Singhvi argued that the Constitution mandates that the speaker should satisfy himself on the genuineness of the resignations and ensure that they have been submitted voluntarily. The attempt by the MLAs, according to Singhvi, was to escape the consequences of anti-defection law and that is why they have decided to resign.
Senior advocate Rajeev Dhawan, appearing for Chief Minister Kumaraswamy, also argued that the Karnataka MLAs had no grounds to approach the Supreme Court with a writ petition under the Article 32—which allows any person to approach the top court if there is a violation of a fundamental right.
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