The Supreme Court on Wednesday deputed a fresh judge of the Madras High Court to hear the petition by 18 disqualified MlAs of AIADMK after a two-judge Bench that heard the case failed to arrive at a decision due to a difference of opinion.
The Vacation Bench of Justices Arun Mishra and SK Kaul assigned the case to Justice M Sathyanarayanan after both sides consented to having a new judge to hear the case. The decision by the court will now replace the decision of the Madras HC Chief Justice appointing Justice S Vimala to hear the case.
The Bench said, “We make it clear that this (order) casts no aspersion on the judge who had been appointed to hear the matter merely because we have appointed another judge of the High Court of Madras.” Although the 18 disqualified MlAs has alleged bias on the choice of Justice Vimala, the Bench directed the petitioners to withdraw all insinuations against any judge and expunged it from the petition.
“The remarks/insinuations stand expunged, including qua the assignment of the case to a particular judge by the first judge of the court,” the order said.
Petitioners’ lawyer senior advocate Vikas Singh also received flak from the court for wrongly stating that the HC pronounced the order on their petitions after six months.
The Bench said, “This petition is irresponsibly drafted. For four months, you argued the case and within 25 days the judgment was delivered.” Singh apologised and withdrew the assertions in this regard.
Singh requested the court to transfer the case from Madras to Delhi HC but the Bench refused. He also urged if a timeframe be fixed for the HC to decide the case expeditiously.
The Bench refused to put a timeframe and asked the petitioners to conclude the arguments early. “If you finish quickly, he will pronounce quickly,” the Bench said.
Tamil Nadu Assembly Speaker P Dhanapal had on September 18, 2017 disqualified the 18 MlAs on the ground that they had tried to pull down AIADMK Government in the State. On June 14, a Division Bench of the Madras High Court gave a split verdict on their petitions challenging the disqualification.
Chief Justice Indira Banerjee upheld the Speaker’s decision to disqualify the MlAs while Justice M Sundar set aside the Speaker’s order on grounds of “perversity, non-compliance with principles of natural justice, mala fides and violation of the constitutional mandate”.