Supreme Court Orders Speaker to Decide Telangana MLAs’ Disqualification Pleas: Calls Delay a Threat to Democracy Bench Led by Justice B.R. Gavai and Justice Sandeep Mehta

A major case regarding the disqualification of the elected representatives when they change parties was recently heard by the Supreme Court of India. What this legal tussle was all about was not disqualifying the representatives, but long time delay by the Speaker of the Legislative Assembly to make a decision. This decision illuminates the essential nature of the Speaker as a judicial figure and the narrow, rather than no authority, of the courts to jump into an otherwise unacted on situation when their supposed assistant, the Speaker, has failed to exercise his duty in a timely fashion.

✖

Little Bit of the History The Case

The case was of some members of the Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) party in Telangana State Legislative Assembly. These members, according to an allegation made against them, changed sides and went to join the Indian National Congress (INC) at the beginning of 2024, after winning the elections in 2023. Subsequently, other members of BRS approached the Speaker of the Telangana Legislative Assembly with the petitions demanding the disqualification of these deserting members under the Tenth Schedule of Indian Constitution.

These petitions the Speaker however did not proceed to act upon many months. Unsatisfied with this non action, the petitioners approached the High Court. The Speaker was ordered by a Single Judge of the High Court to specific a time frame after which the hearing will take place within a time span of four weeks. It was, however later on quashed by a Division Bench of the same High Court. After this, the petitioners went to the Supreme Court. The primary claim was that such a lackadaisical attitude of the Speaker was defeating the very objective of the anti-defection act, and the court must intervene to fix a certain timeline to the ruling.

The Question of Authority and Court Intervention Debate

The case had two conflicting legal positions. The petitioners claimed that the inaction of the Speaker was one of playing a fraud on democracy. They argued that it was the part of the constitutional officer such as the speaker to not to show any biases or partisan tendencies and make legally fought petitions such as disqualification petition without causing unnecessary delays. They resorted to prior rulings especially on the case of

Keisham Meghachandra Singh where the supreme court had fixed a deadline within which a speaker was to take any action.

Conversely, the respondents which comprised the MLAs who were to be disqualified countered by fronting that a court was not in a position to provide timelines to the Speaker. Their counsel argued that a High Court, even under Article 226 of the Constitution cannot question whether the process leading to a final decision made by the Speaker (not the decision itself) is sufficiently fair. They used the classic of the case of

Kihoto Hollohan v. Zachillhu, a case that stipulated that courts are not supposed to employ the quia timet actions, (i.e. they cannot intervene on the basis of a prospective harm). Another point that they presented was that the

Keisham Meghachandra Singh case has been erroneously judged and has failed to look into law laid by larger benches properly. They also pointed out that, in case Parliament would have preferred a limit, that would have been included in the law.

A Trial as a Speech: A Judge Role

The most important point in the court analysis is going back to the nature of the role of the Speaker in resolving the disqualification petitions. The court observed that the Tenth Schedule was brought or rather, inserted into the Constitution (Fifty-second Amendment) Act of 1985 to counter the problem of political defection. The essence of this law was to keep political parties on the right path by ensuring their programs are not compromised by a member who decides to digress to another party.

The court reinstated the principle laid down in the case

Kihoto Hollohan v Zachillhu that when determining a disqualification petition under Tenth schedule, the Speaker is a Tribunal. This is not a legislative power because it is judicial power So, the decision of the Speaker cannot be untouchable and judicial review is applicable. This implies that the decisions that were arrived at by the Speaker can be subject of examination by a court to test whether there was an error in jurisdiction (like a contravention of the constitutional provisions, acted in bad faith or failed to exercise its powers in a natural way as per the norms of natural justice).

The court also took arguments in respect to the quia timet action which implies taking action before an injury has occurred. While the

Kihoto Hollohan case stated that the courts should not normally interfere in an interlocutory stage but it did make an exception on cases that have grave, immediate and irreversible consequences.

The Final Decision of the Court and Its Direction

The Supreme Court disapproved of the suggestion that it was not able to give a time arrow to the Speaker. It noted the fact that it had taken such a long time to even provide an MLAs notice to create specific effect in this case by Speaker. Notices were given only after the case was taken to the Supreme Court. The court termed this as a poor way of doing things by being lackadaisical and failing to be expeditious. It stressed that the Speaker office is to be unbiased and that the long delay acts in contravention of the very functionality of the anti-defection law.

Although the court made no direct decision on whether or not the petition of disqualification by the two members should pass, it stated that the Speaker was required to act reasonably and not arbitrarily. The court based its decision on the fact that in the case of undue and unreasonable delay of the Speaker, the court can make any intervention. Even when it comes to the case of

In Subhash Desai case, the court had said that the Speaker needs to dispose of such petitions within a reasonable time. The case reinforces the argument that though the court should not overstep and intrude into the proceedings of the Speaker, it does have a role to play to see that the Speaker does its judicial work within a reasonable time. The court therein ruled that the Speaker must decide the disqualification petitions within a given period.