Legal experts are of the opinion that the recommendation made by Chief Government Whip S. Rajendran to the Speaker of the Assembly on Thursday to disqualify 19 AIADMK MLAs owing allegiance to sidelined leader T.T.V. Dhinakaran and the consequent show cause notices issued to them by the Speaker would not stand the scrutiny of law.
Justice K. Chandru, former judge of Madras High Court, said the question of disqualification would not arise at all with respect to events that had taken place outside the House. He pointed out that the Whip could not seek disqualification just because the 19 MLAs had met the Governor on Tuesday and expressed certain grievances.
“By giving a letter to the Governor, they are not acting against the party. They are only expressing a different view than that of other party leaders. The Whip is not the chief of the party’s disciplinary committee. He is a Whip inside the House. The MLAs cannot be disqualified but for reasons such as cross voting in the House in defiance of a Whip,” he said.
Mr. Chandru was also of the view that the Speaker ought not to have issued show cause notices to the MLAs under Section 7(1)(b) of the Members of the Tamil Nadu Legislative Assembly (Disqualification on Ground of Defection) Rules of 1986, since the recommendation made by the Whip was not on the basis of an act committed by them inside the House.
Speaker’s jurisdiction
Recalling a privilege motion moved against the publishers of a Tamil journal about a decade ago for writing a news story on certain unsavoury events in the MLA hostel, the former judge said the Madras High Court had then ruled that “the Speaker could not extend his jurisdiction all over the world.”
Expressing similar views, senior counsel K.M. Vijayan said disqualification proceedings initiated under the 1986 Rules could be related only to in-House proceedings.
“If a whip had been issued and if the MLAs had violated it, such an act would come under the purview of the rules, not otherwise,” he added.
“The MLAs’ meeting with the Governor to give a letter withdrawing their support to Chief Minister Edappadi K. Palaniswami might have affected the reputation of their political party, but that is a different issue. It would not attract disqualification,” Mr. Vijayan said, citing Supreme Court’s decision in Balchandra L. Jarkiholi versus B.S. Yeddyurappa (2011).
In that judgment, the apex court had struck down an order passed by the Speaker of the Karnataka Legislative Assembly on October 10, 2010 disqualifying a group of MLAs from the membership of the House for having written a letter to the Governor withdrawing support to the government led by the then Chief Minister Mr. Yeddyurappa.
