Maharashtra Speaker cannot defeat our orders: Supreme Court urges for quick decision on disqualification of rebel MLAs

The Supreme Court on Friday pulled up the Speaker of the Maharashtra Legislative Assembly for the delay in deciding on the disqualification proceedings against rebel Members of Legislative Assembly (MLAs) of the erstwhile Shiv Sena party. [Sunil Prabhu v. The Speaker, Maharashtra State Legislative Assembly].A Bench of Chief Justice of India (CJI) DY Chandrachud and Justices JB Pardiwala and Manoj Misra said that the decision has to be taken well before the next elections and that the proceedings cannot go on till they become infructuous.The Court asked Solicitor General of India Tushar Mehta and Maharashtra Advocate General Dr Birendra Saraf to advise the Speaker to do so. It warned that if by Monday, there is no proper timeline prescribed for concluding the proceedings, the top court itself would set a timeline. “Somebody has to advise the Speaker that he cannot defeat the orders of the Supreme Court. What kind of time schedule is he prescribing? The idea of the schedule cannot be to delay the hearing … Else their apprehension is correct,” CJI Chandrachud remarked..The comment from the top court came after Senior Advocate Kapil Sibal, representing Sunil Prabhu, an MLA of the Uddhav Thackeray faction of the Shiv Sena, questioned the procedure adopted by the Speaker for deciding on the proceedings.Taking a serious view of the concerns raised, CJI Chandrachud said that the Speaker must at least give the impression that he is dealing with the matter seriously and said that it cannot “be a charade.”“The writ of this court has to run when there is a decision contrary to the Constitution of India,” the Court said..The Court urged the Speaker to hold day-to-day proceedings in the matter and complete it soon. The CJI further said that the Speaker is an election tribunal, which is amenable to the jurisdiction of the top court.“The procedure which is prescribed has to be given an impression that there is a serious consideration of what is happening,” the Court said. .Last month, the Supreme Court had directed the Speaker to issue procedural directions and timelines towards disposing of the disqualification petitions pending against rebel Shiv Sena legislators within a week. The Bench had stressed that the proceedings in this regard, which have been pending since May, cannot go on indefinitely.Today, the Court said that if there is no action even after that, it would be constrained to say that the Speaker must take a decision in two months. “Some kind of seriousness has to be imparted in a tribunal under the Tenth Schedule and proceedings under such tribunals cannot become a charade and we have to engender confidence in the process,” the CJI said..The Court was hearing a plea to expeditiously decide disqualification petitions pending against the MLAs.In July this year, the Court had sought the response of the Speaker in the matter.The plea by Sunil Prabhu was filed soon after Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) leader Ajit Pawar and eight MLAs, including Praful Patel and Chhagan Bhujbal, joined the Eknath Shinde faction.In his plea, Prabhu highlighted that a Supreme Court Constitution Bench had, on May 11 this year, directed the Speaker to decide the pending disqualification petitions within a reasonable period. However, no such step has yet been taken, he submitted. As per the plea, the constitutional requirement of fairness requires the Speaker to decide on the question of disqualification in an expeditious manner. Prabhu further contended that the Speaker’s inaction in deciding the disqualification proceedings "is an act of grave constitutional impropriety.“