The bench of Chief Election Commissioner of India Rajiv Kumar and Election Commissioner Anup Chandra Pandey on Tuesday started hearing the office of the profit case against chief minister Hemant Soren.
The next date of the hearing has been fixed to July 14 and hearing of a similar case against his brother Basant Soren has been fixed to July 15. His lawyers namely S.K Mendiratta and Meenakshi Arora were present during the hearing.
Maninder Singh and Shidarth Dave argued for the BJP for around two hours. They claimed that Hemant Soren as chief minister of Jharkhand secured a stone mining lease in his name. By this, he has violated section 9A of the People’s Representation Act 1951 hence his membership of the Assembly should be terminated as he obtained a contract with the government.
A lawyer who appeared for the BJP said that Meenakshi Arora sought more time and she requested the ECI to defer the hearing to any next date. The lawyer said that ECI was unhappy with Hemant Soren seeking an extension of the hearing.
On June 14, the ECI gave him a final date of June 28 to file his reply. On that date, Hemant Soren pleaded that his lawyer is not available. Earlier on May 30, the ECI gave him another date June 14 as his mother Rupi Soren was under treatment in Hyderabad.
The BJP is the complainant in this matter and sent a petition to Jharkhand governor Ramesh Bais to demand his disqualification. The Governor under section 192 (2) of the Constitution of India, referred this matter to the ECI which sent him a notice to reply whether his membership in the Jharkhand assembly should be terminated.
A PIL 727/2022 filed by Shiv Shankar Sharma is being heard by the Jharkhand High Court.