Hyderabad: The Telangana High Court on Thursday held a marathon hearing in the petitions seeking directions to the Speaker to disqualify BRS MLAs Danam Nagender, Kadiam Srihari and Tellam Venkat Rao for defecting to the Congress.
After the completion of arguments from the side of the defected MLAs, Supreme Court advocate Aryama Sundaram submitted arguments on behalf of the petitioners, BRS legislators Padi Kaushik Reddy and K.P. Vivekanand.
Sundaram argued that the disqualification petitions must be decided within three months to adhere to the constitutional objective of disqualifying persons who have violated the Tenth Schedule.
Counsel argued that it was not proper to leave the decision to the Speaker, generally elected from the ruling party. He cited that the Supreme Court also noted the political affiliation of the Speaker in the case of the Speaker of the Manipur Assembly.
The Supreme Court had opined that it was time for Parliament to reconsider whether the power to decide on disqualification petitions should be kept with the Speaker, who is elected on a party ticket, or not. Moreover, the Speaker shall be deemed to be the chairman of the tribunal.
Constitutional courts can conduct judicial review on the orders of the chairman of the tribunal, he said.
Justice B. Vijaysen Reddy, adjourned further hearing to August 5.
