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Within days of the Speaker's decision, Shiv Sena (UBT) had filed the petition against the Speaker's judgments while claiming that Shinde has unconstitutionally usurped power and is heading an unconstitutional Government in Maharashtra, which is extremely prejudicial and causing irreparable harm and injury to the petitioner, as well as to the general public
CJI DY Chandrachud today agreed to hear the plea by Uddhav Thackeray-led Shiv Sena challenging the Maharashtra Assembly Speaker's decision of January 10, 2024 dismissing its disqualification petition filed against Chief Minister Eknath Shinde and other MLAs on January 22, 2024.
Senior Advocate Kapil Sibal mentioned the plea before the bench also comprising Justices JB Pardiwala and Manoj Misra.
"It listed on Friday. If it can be on Monday. There is no opposition to this..", Sibal told the bench.
The party has questioned the Speaker's decision, which "erroneously" holds that the 2018 leadership structure cannot be relied upon as it purportedly does not conform with the provisions of the Shiv Sena's Constitution.
Claiming the Speaker's decisions as "unlawful and perverse", it claimed, "All impugned decisions are premised on a common finding that the majority of legislators represented the will of the political party, and therefore, they are not liable for disqualification. This amounts to a complete inversion of the Tenth Schedule".
It contended that the decision by the Speaker was against the Supreme Court's judgment in 'Subhash Desai Vs Governor of Maharashtra' (2022), as it conflated the concept of ‘legislature party’ with the ‘political party’ and held that since the faction led by Eknath Shinde has a ‘legislative majority’, the same has to be considered as the ‘real political party’.
Earlier this month, the Shiv Sena faction led by Uddhav Thackeray had also filed an application in the Supreme Court bringing to its notice the Assembly Speaker's meeting with Maharashtra Chief Minister Eknath Shinde on January 7, ahead of him pronouncing the verdict in the disqualification petitions, terming it as "highly improper".
It has been contended that the meeting ahead of the crucial deadline of January 10 to pronounce orders on disqualification petitions raises questions about fairness and impartiality of the decision-making process.
On December 15, 2023 Supreme Court had granted an extension of 10 days to Maharashtra Assembly Speaker in deciding the disqualification petitions filed by Uddhav Thackeray led faction of Shiv Sena.
Earlier, the bench of CJI DY Chandrachud, Justice JB Pardiwala and Justice Manoj Misra had directed the Speaker to decide the petitions by December 31, 2023.
Solicitor General Tushar Mehta had in fact requested the bench for a three-week extension from December 31, 2023.
Supreme Court had earlier given a 'last chance' to the Maharashtra Speaker to come up with a schedule to hear the disqualification petitions pending before him. Court was visibly irked with the Speaker giving interviews saying that court is a co-equal branch of the government and not doing his job.
On October 13, Supreme Court had asked the Speaker to hear the disqualification petitions pending before him on a day-to-day basis and decide them before the upcoming elections.
The Sharad Pawar led faction of the Nationalist Congress Party had also knocked on the Supreme Court's door, asking it to direct the Maharashtra Speaker to decide the disqualification petitions filed by it against the Ajit Pawar led faction.
Cause Title: Sunil Prabhu vs. The Speaker, Maharashtra State Legislative Assembly
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