HC issues notices to Assembly Speaker, 7 BRS-turned-Congress legislators

The Telangana High Court on Wednesday issued notices to the Assembly Speaker and seven MLAs, originally elected on a BRS ticket, who have since joined the Congress party.

The notices were issued by a division bench, comprising Chief Justice Aparesh Kumar Singh and Justice Ghouse Meera Mohiduddin, in a batch of seven writs challenging the Speaker’s orders dismissing disqualification petitions filed against the legislators under the Tenth Schedule to the constitution.

The seven legislators named as respondents in the proceedings are T Prakash Goud(Rajendranagar), Venkat Rao Tellam (Bhadradri-Kothagudem), Arekapudi Gandhi (Seril Lingampally), Bandla Krishna Mohan Reddy (Jogulamba Gadwal), Kale Yadaiah (Vikarabad), Danam Nagender (Khairatabad) and Srinivas Reddy Parige (Banswada). They are stated to be actively participating in the Assembly proceedings despite their alleged defection from the BRS.

The bench adjourned the writs to April 16, directing the respondents and the Speaker to file their respective counters within the period. An eighth petition, filed earlier and challenging the Speaker’s order dismissing the disqualification petition against Nagender has been tagged with the writs and will be heard alongside them.

The petitions have been filed by BRS legislators who had moved disqualification petitions before the Speaker seeking the disqualification of the seven MLAs on the ground of voluntary relinquishment of party membership, as envisaged under Paragraph 2(1)(a) of the Tenth Schedule. The Speaker, however, dismissed the disqualification writs; the petitions seek to set aside those dismissal orders.

Gandra Mohan Rao, senior counsel appearing for the petitioners, argued that the seven MLAs defected to the Congress without tendering their resignation from the BRS and that they publicly met the TPCC president and CM A Revanth Reddy, before being formally and publicly inducted into the ruling party an event that received widespread coverage across the media.

Rao contended that the collective acts unambiguously established that the MLAs had voluntarily given up their BRS membership, thereby attracting disqualification under the Tenth Schedule without the necessity of any further inquiry or formal determination by the Speaker.

He contended that the Speaker, in practice, acted on disqualification petitions only upon directions from superior courts, submitting that he had commenced adjudication of the pending disqualification petitions, which had remained undecided for over a year only after the Supreme Court issued a specific direction. These contentions, it was argued, bear upon the propriety and legality of the dismissal orders now under challenge. The writs each respectively challenging the Speaker’s dismissal of disqualification petitions nos 7, 2, 11, 6, 5, 1, and 10 of 2024, have been listed together. The case is posted for hearing on April 16 upon receipt of counters from the respondents.