Madras High Court rejects plea to disqualify OPS and 10 other MLAs

Chennai: In a major relief to the Edappadi Government, the Madras High Court on Friday rejected a plea to disqualify Deputy Chief Minister O Pannerselvam and 10 other MLAs of his faction who had voted against the government in February 2017.

Dismissing a batch of petitions filed by DMK whip K Sakkarapani and four pro-TTV Dinakaran MLAs seeking a direction to the Speaker to disqualify Pannerselvam and others as they had defied the whip and voted against the government when it sought the confidence vote, the court said any such direction would amount to infringing on the powers of the Speaker.

The First Bench of Chief Justice Indira Banerjee and Justice Abdul Quddhose held that issuing such a direction to the Speaker would amount to” judicial overreach” and encroaching upon the powers of the legislature. The judges held it would not be possible to issue a direction to the Speaker to act upon representations made by the petitioners when he, in his discretion, had chosen not to act.

The bench also noted that the Constitution Bench of the Supreme Court was seized of the issue as to whether courts could intervene in case of studied inaction by a Speaker. While the disqualification of an MLA was subject to judicial review, the court cannot come into the picture unless and until the Speaker acts on it, it said.

The court, however, granted leave to senior counsel R. Shanmugasundaram, representing the DMK whip, to appeal to the Supreme Court as the case involved interpretation of constitutional provisions.

Though Pannerselvam and 10 others voted against the Edappadi Government on Feb 18 on 2017 the Speaker did not take any action against them. They subsequently merged their faction with the Edappadi group in September last year and the reunited AIADMK got the frozen Two Leaves symbol.

This irked TTV no end as he, along with his aunt Sasikala, had installed Edappadi in power along with 123 MLAs in the hope he would keep the seat warm for him.

Paving the way for the return of the OPS fold, Edappadi expelled jailed general secretary V K Sasikala and Dhinakaran and abolished the posts and deputy general secretary at the general council last September. OPS was made Deputy Chief Minister and party coordinator while EPS became the joint coordinator of the AIADMK.

TTV hit back getting his 18 MLAs to petition the Governor seeking removal of Edappadi as CM. This led to Speaker Dhanapalan disqualifying the 18, on the ground that they had voluntarily relinquished the party by petitioning against the Government.

Four of pro-Dinakaran MLAs, including Vettrivel, challenged the disqualification in the High Court, citing the differing stands taken by the Speaker on identical issues to show his action were mala fide.

With the High Court now refusing to interfere in the Speaker's decision, 11 MLAs have saved their seat - including not just OPS but also Tamil language and culture Minister K. Pandiarajan and Mylapore MLA and former DGP Nataraj.