The Supreme Court on Tuesday granted Maharashtra Assembly Speaker Rahul Narwekar a final opportunity to set up a realistic timeframe to decide the disqualification petitions against Maharashtra Chief Minister Eknath Shinde and the Shiv Sena MLAs supporting him, PTI reported.
The disqualification proceedings against them were started in June 2022 by Nationalist Congress Party leader Narhari Zirwal, who was the deputy speaker at the time. This was after Shinde and others had rebelled and triggered the fall of Uddhav Thackeray’s Maha Vikas Aghadi government.
At Tuesday’s hearing, a bench headed by Chief Justice of India DY Chandrachud said that they were not satisfied with the time schedule.
Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, however, told the bench that he would engage with the Speaker to indicate a firm procedure on the matter during the Dussehra break. The court has posted the case for hearing on October 30.
Following the fall of Maha Vikas Aghadi government last year, the two Shiv Sena factions had filed a batch of disqualification pleas against each other’s MLAs.
Shinde and the 15 MLAs in his camp filed separate petitions challenging the disqualification notices that Zirwal had sent to them. Shiv Sena (Uddhav Balasaheb Thackeray) MP Sunil Prabhu then filed an interlocutory application seeking quick disposal of the cases.
On May 11, a five-judge bench had directed the Maharashtra Speaker to hear and decide the disqualification petitions within a “reasonable time”.
However, Narwekar did not go ahead with the proceedings despite the top court’s direction. On several occasions since it first passed the direction, the Supreme Court has urged Narwekar to decide on the disqualification pleas.
On September 18, the Supreme Court asked him to spell out the timeline for adjudication of the petitions. On September 21, Narwekar had said that he would not delay the matter but would not rush into it either as it may result in miscarriage of justice, reported the Hindustan Times.
At last week’s hearing, the top court had pulled up Narwekar, saying that a decision on the matter must be taken before the next Assembly elections or the process will become infructuous. Elections will take place in Maharashtra in November 2024.
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