Hyderabad: The Telangana High Court on Friday issued notices to the Chairman of the State Legislative Council, the secretary, and to MLCs Akula Lalitha, T. Santosh Kumar, M.S. Prabhakar Rao and Kuchukulla Damodar Reddy, who defected from the Congress to the TRS and claimed merger of the Congress Legislature Party in the Council with the TRS Legislature Party.
A division bench comprising acting Chief Justice Raghavendra Singh Chauhan and Justice A. Rajasheker Reddy was dealing with a petition filed by practicing advocates G. Malleswara Rao and C. Balajee challenging the decision of then Council Chairman K. Swamy Goud to issue the Bulletin No. 9 towards the merger of the legislative parties. The advocates claimed that the Chairman had acted unconstitutionally.
Mr Mallikarjuna Sharma, counsel for the petitioners, submitted to the court that the Mr Goud had exceeded his constitutional powers, and urged that the bulletin issued for merging the Congress MLCs with the TRS Legislature Party be suspended. He argued that Bulletin No. 9 was ultra vires of the constitutional provisions of the Xth Schedule and the Articles 102, 191, and 324 of the Constitution.
The bench directed the respondents to respond to the contentions within four weeks. Mr Shabbir Ali, then Opposition leader in the Council, had filed a similar petition which is pending.
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