Supreme Court Hears BRS MLAs' Defection Petition

The Supreme Court today took up the case seeking the disqualification of turncoat BRS MLAs who switched to the ruling Congress in Telangana.

A bench comprising Justices B R Gavai and George Masih heard a petition filed by BRS MLA Padi Kaushik Reddy.

The petition pertains to the disqualification of BRS MLAs Kadiyam Srihari, Danam Nagender and Vellam Venkata Rao. (A total of ten BRS MLAs, including the three named, had defected to the Congress after winning on BRS tickets.)

Reddy's counsel informed the court that in March last year the Telangana High Court had directed State Assembly Speaker G Prasad Kumar to decide on the disqualification of the defected MLAs within four months. However, no decision had been taken so far, he said, and alleged that the Speaker was deliberately delaying the decision.

Senior advocate Mukul Rohatgi, representing the State Legislature Secretary, said that notices had already been issued to the MLAs, and also pointed out that the Supreme Court had previously directed the Speaker to allow adequate time for the MLAs to respond before making a decision.

The court then asked Rohatgi what in his view constituted an "adequate" time frame for deciding on the disqualification of the BRS MLAs.

It further asked whether a "reasonable time" meant delaying the decision until the end of the Assembly's term, as had happened in Maharashtra.

Rohatgi responded that his client would urge the Speaker to take a decision at the earliest. The bench then instructed Rohatgi to ascertain how much time the Speaker required to resolve the issue, and scheduled the matter for further hearing next week.