Rajasthan Assembly Speaker C P Joshi Wednesday moved the Supreme Court against the high court directive to defer till July 24 the disqualification proceedings against 19 dissident Congress MLAs, including sacked deputy chief minister Sachin Pilot.
The high court had Tuesday said it would deliver its order on July 24 on a petition filed by Pilot and 18 other MLAs, challenging the disqualification notices sent to them. It asked the Speaker to defer the disqualification proceedings till then.
The Speaker, in his plea filed through advocate Sunil Fernandes, has said that the disqualification process is part of the Assembly proceedings and hence, the high court could not have interfered by asking him to defer it till Friday.
The Speaker’s counsel had twice before agreed to the high court’s “request” to extend the deadline for receiving replies from the MLAs to the show cause notices.
Pilot and 18 dissident Congress MLAs have challenged their disqualification notices in the high court.
The notices to MLAs were served after the party complained to the Speaker that the legislators had allegedly defied a whip to attend two Congress Legislature Party meetings, on Monday and Tuesday last week.
The Pilot camp, however, has argued that a party whip applies only when the Assembly is in session.
In its complaint to the Legislative Assembly Speaker, the Congress had sought action against Pilot and the other dissidents under paragraph 2(1)(a) of the 10th Schedule of the Constitution.
Pilot was sacked as deputy chief minister and the president of the state unit of the party after he rebelled against Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot.
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