New Delhi: The Delhi high court on Wednesday dismissed the pleas of two AAP MLAs, Anil Bajpai and Col Devender Sehrawat, seeking recusal of the legislative assembly speaker from the disqualification proceedings against them.
A bench of Chief Justice D.N. Patel and Justice C. Hari Shankar said it finds no reason to entertain the appeals challenging the single judge order and added that it is the prerogative of the speaker to decide on the preliminary objection and disqualification petition together.
“We see no reason to impose any mathematical formula on the speaker to decide the issue,” the bench said.
The MLAs challenged the single judge’s order which dismissed their pleas for a direction to Delhi assembly speaker Ram Niwas Goel to recuse from hearing the petition for their disqualification under the anti-defection law.
They claimed that the single judge has not appreciated their grounds for seeking recusal of the speaker and their grievances have not been heard.
The single judge, in its July 8 order, had said there was “no infirmity” in the procedure adopted by the Speaker and rejected the MLAs’ allegation of bias as also the contention that he should have first decided their application for recusal before going ahead with disqualification proceedings.
There is no law stating that the Speaker has to decide the issues “piecemeal”, the judge said, adding that he can comprehensively decide the entire matter.
AAP MLA Saurabh Bharadwaj on June 10 filed the petition seeking their disqualification under the anti-defection law for allegedly joining the BJP.
The speaker had on June 17 issued notice to the two MLAs asking them to file their response by July 8.
The court had noted the submission of the speaker that the MLAs would be granted two more days to file their response to the notice on the petition seeking their disqualification under the anti-defection law. The MLAs have filed their response before the speaker.
The duo had alleged that the speaker is not supposed to have political inclinations, but was seen attending events and protests of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP).
They said the speaker was even seen “dancing” in the Lok Sabha poll campaign of AAP candidate Atishi Marlena.
They alleged that in these circumstances, the speaker might not impartially adjudicate the disqualification proceedings and the issue be sent either to the deputy speaker or a committee be constituted to hear the matter.
“It is stated that there is every likelihood that respondent 1 (speaker) won’t impartially adjudicate the present matter because he is acting as an active member of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) which has initiated the anti-defection proceeding,” the petitions had said.
On the other hand, the lawyers for the speaker and Bharadwaj told the court that the petition was not maintainable as Sehrawat had not disclosed that he had earlier moved the Supreme Court against the notice issued to him and had withdrawn the plea after the apex court declined to hear it.
