SC gives Maharashtra speaker 10 more days to decide on Sena MLAs disqualification

Uddhav Vs Shinde

The Supreme Court on December 15 granted an additional 10 days to the Maharashtra assembly speaker Rahul Narwekar to decide on the disqualification pleas of Shiv Sena MLAs.

The court had set December 31 as deadline but as the court will remain closed for the winter break from December 16-January 2, the speaker sought an extension.

Appearing for the speaker, solicitor general Tushar Mehta told the court that the hearings of disqualification pleas were being conducted regularly and were likely to conclude in a few days. Documents running into over 2.7 lakh pages were filed and since the speaker was not trained to adjudicate like judges, he could need more time to pass order. Mehta sought a 15-day extension but the court agreed to 10 days.

In October 2023, the  court directed the speaker to decide petitions seeking disqualification of breakaway faction of the Shiv Sena MLAs by December 31.

The court also asked Narwekar to decide disqualification petitions against Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) MLAs by January 31. The cases will now come up for hearing in the second week of January.

The court passed the orders on petitions filed by members of Shiv Sena's Uddhav Balasaheb Thackeray faction and the Sharad Pawar unit of NCP seeking direction to the speaker to decide the disqualification pleas soon in keeping with the May 2023 order of the constitution bench.

The Thackeray faction moved the court in July, seeking direction to speaker to adjudicate the disqualification petitions in a time-bound manner.

The plea by Shiv Sena (Uddhav) MLA Sunil Prabhu, who as the chief whip of the undivided Shiv Sena, filed the disqualification petitions against Eknath Shinde and other MLAs in 2022, alleging Narwekar was deliberately delaying his decision.

While saying that the Maharashtra governor was not justified in calling upon then chief minister Uddhav Thackeray to prove majority in the assembly on June 30, 2022,  a constitution bench refused to order status quo ante, saying he did not face the floor test and resigned.

The court directed the speaker of the assembly to decide on the disqualification of MLAs who switched to the Shinde faction, leading to a split in Sena.

The Shinde faction joined hands with the BJP to bring down the Thackeray government. A split in the NCP, which, too, was part of the Thackeray-led ruling coalition followed.