SC seeks response of Maha CM, MLAs on Thackeray group’s plea

NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Monday sought responses from Chief Minister Eknath Shinde and other lawmakers of his group on a plea of the Uddhav Thackeray faction challenging Maharashtra Legislative Assembly Speaker Rahul Narwekar’s order declaring the Shiv Sena bloc led by Shinde as the “real political party” after its split in June 2022.

A bench comprising Chief Justice D Y Chandrachud and Justices JB Pardiwala and Manoj Misra took note of the submissions of senior advocates Kapil Sibal and Abhishek Singhvi, appearing for the Thackeray faction, and sought response of the chief minister and other MLAs within two weeks.

At the outset, the top court said the plea can be heard by the Bombay High Court as well. The senior lawyers for the Thackeray faction, however, opposed the idea and said the top court is more equipped to handle the case.

The Supreme Court, which initially intended to grant Shinde and the MLAs of his bloc four weeks to submit their replies, later fixed the case after two weeks.

The Thackeray faction, in its plea filed through MLA Sunil Prabhu, has alleged that Shinde “unconstitutionally usurped power” and is heading an “unconstitutional government”.

In his order passed on January 10, Speaker Narwekar had also rejected the Thackeray faction’s plea to disqualify 16 MLAs of the ruling camp, including Shinde.

Challenging the orders passed by the Speaker, the Thackeray faction has claimed they are “patently unlawful and perverse” and that instead of punishing the act of defection, they reward the defectors by holding that they comprise the real political party.

“All impugned decisions are premised on a common finding that the majority of legislators represented the will of the political party, and therefore, they are not liable for disqualification,” the plea said.

This amounts to a complete inversion of the 10th Schedule, which is intended to disqualify legislators who act against their political party, it said.

“However, if the majority of legislators are treated to be the political party, then the members of the actual political party become subject to the will of the majority of legislators. This is totally against the Constitutional scheme, and is consequently liable to be set aside,” the petition said.

It said the speaker had erred in holding that the majority legislators of the Shiv Sena represented the will of the Shiv Sena political party.

As an interim relief, the petition has sought an ex-parte stay on the operation and effect of the January 10 order passed by the speaker, pending a decision on the plea before the apex court. It has also sought an interim relief restraining the Shinde faction from issuing directions to the group of Shiv Sena MLAs led by Thackeray.