The Supreme Court vacated its stay Thursday on a new government being formed in Arunachal Pradesh after the Union Cabinet advised President Pranab Mukhejee to revoke Central rule in the state.
The Supreme Court vacated its stay Thursday on a new government being formed in Arunachal Pradesh after the Union Cabinet advised President Pranab Mukhejee to revoke Central rule in the state.
Within hours of the Cabinet’s decision on Wednesday, the Supreme Court had ordered the status quo and restrained the Arunachal Pradesh governor from taking steps to form a new government led by rebel Congressman Kalikho Pul.
On Thursday, after the Supreme Court’s go-ahead, reports from Itanagar, Arunachal’s capital, indicated that Mr Pul, a former state finance minister, might take the oath as the new CM as early as Friday.
Though Raj Bhavan is yet to formally invite Mr Pul, who staked claim to forming the government with the support of over 32 MLAs in the 60-member Arunachal Assembly, claiming the support of 11 BJP MLAs too, sources in the dissident camp told this newspaper Raj Bhavan may call Mr Pul on Friday itself for the swearing-in. If that event, he is likely to take the oath of office alone.
Earlier, the ongoing legal battle of the ousted Nabam Tuki-led Congress government got a major setback on Thursday as the Supreme Court cleared the way for a new government after it was “satisfied” with the Gauhati high court order staying the disqualification of 14 rebel MLAs.
The Supreme Court on Thursday cleared the decks for the revocation of President’s Rule, that was imposed on January 26, as it vacated its own order of status quo that it passed on Wednesday. The Centre had Wednesday held back its decision to revoke President’s Rule in the wake of the court’s order.
The 60-member Assembly now has 58 MLAs, with two MLAs having resigned. Though the Speaker disqualified 14 rebel Congress MLAs, the Gauhati high court stayed the disqualification and the Supreme Court refused to stay the order during the hearing of appeals.
On Wednesday, a five-judge Constitution Bench of Justices J.S. Khehar, Dipak Misra, Madn B. Lokur, Pinaki Chandra Ghose and N.V. Ramana directed the Centre to maintain the “status quo” and summoned original records from the high court on the original disqualification matter initiated by then Speaker Nabam Rebia. The court got the records in the afternoon.
Justices J.S. Khehar and Dipak Misra told senior counsel Fali S. Nariman, Kapil Sibal and Ram Jethmalani: “Prima facie we are not inclined to interfere with the high court order staying the disqualification of 14 MLAs, we are satisfied with it.”
Justice Khehar told the counsel: “When we passed the status quo order yesterday, we were conscious of the seriousness. Two things were worrying us: the submission that the notice of disqualification of 14 MLAs was not served on them and the order of disqualification was also not pasted in their residences as it was claimed. We have seen the original records and we are satisfied these two things were not complied with, and the high court had rightly interfered.”
The bench also transferred the case on disqualification of the 14 legislators from the single judge to a division bench of the high court and asked it to expeditiously decide the matter in two weeks. The bench, however, made it clear any further action taken will be subject to the outcome of the matter pending before it.
