HC admits Cong plea to disqualify Rane from contesting bypoll

The Bombay High Court on Tuesday admitted the Congress' plea seeking disqualification of its former MLA and incumbent BJP minister Vishwajit Rane from contesting the upcoming Valpoi assembly bypoll till 2022.

Justice Mahesh Sonak of the Goa bench of the Bombay High Court admitted for detailed hearing the petition filed by the Congress party on May 12, seeking the court's order to disqualify the minister from running the state assembly election for the next five years or till the present house is dissolved.

Rane, who had won the Valpoi assembly seat on a Congress ticket in the February 4 state polls, had resigned as its MLA on March 16 to join the BJP. He was inducted into the state cabinet led by Chief Minister Manohar Parrikar on April 12.

To retain his ministerial berth, he has to get re-elected as a member of the assembly within six months of his swearing-in as a minister.

While admitting the petition, the court said, "There is prima facie merit in the prayers."

The court also granted another four weeks to the Goa legislative assembly Speaker Dr Pramod Sawant and Pro-tem Speaker Siddharat Kuncolienkar to reply to the plea.

The court had issued notices to speaker and the pro-tem speaker on May 19.

Both of them, however, have failed to reply to the notice.

In its order on Tuesday, the court dismissed Rane's objection that as per the Constitution, the petitioner should have first approached the assembly speaker with the disqualification plea rather than pleading before the high court.

In the plea, the Congress said that by abstaining from voting in the assembly on March 16 and by voluntarily giving up his membership of the party, Rane had automatically incurred disqualification for being a member of the House from March 16, 2017 to March 15, 2022.