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State of Maharastra concluded arguments in Supreme Court today put forth by Senior Advocate CA Sundaram in the plea against suspension of 12 Bharatiya Janta Party (BJP) MLAs for a period of 1 year.

A Supreme Court bench of Justices AM Khanwilkar, Dinesh Maheshwari and CT Ravikumar today remarked that there is no absolute power with the privilege committee, it is bound by the constitution and the law made by parliament.

Justice Khanwilkar said, "It is to control the dignity of the assembly for the day or for the session, once the session is over it cannot be indefinite."

The petition has been filed challenging the suspension of 12 BJP MLAs - Sanjay Kute, Ashish Shelar, Abhimanyu Pawar, Girish Mahajan, Atul Bhatkalkar, Parag Alavni, Harish Pimpale, Ram Satpute, Vijay Kumar Rawal, Yogesh Sagar, Narayan Kuche and Kirtikumar Bangdia stating that under the Maharashtra Legislative Council Rules, Rule 59, the Speaker has the sole right to suspend members on the ground of unruly behavior, however, in this case, the suspension has taken place after a resolution of the assembly.

On July 5, 2021, 12 BJP MLA's were suspended on account of "misbehavior". It is against this resolution that they approached Supreme Court.

Sundaram submitted that "If the conduct lowers the dignity of the house then it's not that he may be removed for a session, he may be suspended."

Justice Khanwilkar said that "The point when you say it has to be rational, it has to be in proportion. Anything beyond that would be irrational. This specific issue has never arisen before."

"The citizen cannot put forward the argument that they are unrepresented because of the act of their member. But they can certainly say that when his duly elected member is not disqualified but not allowed to sit beyond a period of 6 months," Justice Khanwilkar added.

However, Sundaram while referring to the judgment in the case of Raja Rampal argued that "The act doesn't make the seat vacant it's for the house to decide."

Sundaram further argued that "the power of the legislature to suspend a member is available and that power itself not be open to judicial review."

Sundaram also contended that "If I have the power to punish, and the constitution and the legislature don't define what the punishment would be, it is the power of the assembly to decide."

"In Raja Rampal case, you cannot say that the constituency is affected and that is why you cannot do this. He is still the representative of the constituency but the bar is to participate in house," Sundaram added.

In furtherance to this Justice Khanwilkar said, "The constituency can not be left unrepresented for such a long time, that is the point that we want to deal with, we have no direct judgment except Balton."

Whereas, Sundarad argued that "Judicial review arises in various activities, judicial review of a judicial order, of administrative action, legislation, in each of which the scope of judicial review is different."

"I'm bringing up a point which is different from all these... it's a judicial review of whether the members of legislative has performed their duty or not," Sundaram added.

Sundaram concluded his arguments by stating that there are several areas where the Judicial review can take place but there is one area because of the Doctrine of Separation of powers where it cannot take place.

The bench will continue hearing the matter tomorrow i.e January 19, 2022/

Case Title: Ashish Shelar and Ors. Vs. Maharashtra Legislative Assembly