Congress MLAs Komatireddy Venkat Reddy of the Nalgonda constituency and S A Sampath Kumar of the Alampur constituency in Mahbubnagar heaved a sigh of relief with the High Court quashing the orders of the Telangana Assembly expelling the two Congress MLAs.
The High Court directed the Legislature Secretary to revive their membership of the Assembly immediately.
The court said that the state government was at liberty to prosecute the MLAs if it had evidence that they had resorted to violence in the Assembly, but that the decision to expel the duo was not correct.
For the uninitiated, the Congress MLAs allegedly threw headphones in the Assembly when the Governor was delivering his speech during the budget session inaugural on March 12. Reddy allegedly
hurled a headphone at the Governor to injure him, but it missed the Governor and hurt Council chairman K Swamy Goud reportedly damaging his eye.
After conclusion of the Governor's speech, Goud was rushed to the Sarojini Devi Eye Hospital. Following the incident, the Speaker
expelled Reddy and Sampath Kumar. The Legislature secretariat also issued a GO stating that the two MLAs' membership was cancelled, and recommended to the Election Commission that it conduct by-elections to the two Assembly seats.
The two MLAs
approached the High Court claiming that their expulsion from the Assembly was against democratic norms. The High Court heard the case. In the middle of the case, Advocate General Prakash Reddy tendered his resignation. The High Court delivered its verdict today.
The High Court struck down the gazette notification issued by the government notifying the vacancies of the two seats and the official note sent to the Election Commission of India asking for the conduct of by-elections to the Nalgonda and Alampur Assembly seats. The court said that Reddy and Kumar would continue as MLAs for the rest of their terms as their expulsion from the House was illegal.
Senior advocate Jandhyala Ravishankar, who defended the Congress MLAs, said that all GOs automatically stood abolished with the ruling.