Newmai News Network
Imphal | May 8
After hearing the preliminary objections to the petitions of the Congress MLAs seeking disqualification of seven MLAs, the tribunal of Speaker of Manipur Legislative Assembly on Friday reserved the ruling.
The tribunal of the Speaker heard the preliminary objections submitted by the seven MLAs - Oinam Lukhoi, Ksh Biren, Paonam Brojen, Sanasam Bira, Ngamthang Haokip, Ginsuanhau Zou and Yengkhom Surchandra – through their counsels.
The counsels prayed the tribunal o the Assembly Speaker not to accept the petitions saying that it has no merit and also citing lack of proper investigation.
The hearing of the long pending disqualification petitions filed by Congress MLAs was held in the tribunal of the Speaker Y Khemchand on Friday.
After day’s hearing, the Speaker said that the tribunal reserved the judgment without announcing any date for declaration of the decision in the backdrop of prevailing COVID-19 situation in the state.
He explained that the tribunal will try its best for early declaration of its decision if the situation improves.
The hearing of the long pending cases taken up on Friday was a week after the Congress expressed its willingness to go to the Supreme Court if the Speaker’s tribunal fails to come with its final decision despite Supreme Court’s directive of disposing all the cases related with 10th Schedule of Indian Constitution within three months.
It can be noted here that the apex court had given the ruling during hearing to the petitions related to the pending disqualification case of the then Forest minister Th Shyamkumar who was disqualified from being an MLA after the intervention by the apex court on March 28.
The seven MLAs were elected on Congress ticket to the Manipur Assembly in March 2017 but they had joined the BJP without resigning from their MLAship.
As many as 15 petitions seeking disqualification of the MLAs were filed to the tribunal of the Speaker in November 2018 but remained without declaring its final decision till date.
In February last, the tribunal had taken up the cases for hearing along with the disqualification case of the then Forest and Environment minister Th Shyamkumar.
The tribunal had directed the seven Congress MLAs to submit their written replies to the disqualification petitions filed against them on or before February 28, 2020.
The hearing of the cases was however deferred till today following a plea of the respondents' counsel to give more time to file their counter affidavit.
