Appeal filed in Supreme Court after Rajasthan High Court refuses stay on counting votes of turncoat BSP MLAs in Rajya Sabha polls

The dispute surrounding the voting of six turncoat MLAs of Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) MLAs in the Rajasthan Assembly for the Rajya Sabha elections, has reached the Supreme Court [Hemant Nahta vs Hon'ble Speaker, Rajasthan Assembly]..An appeal was filed before the top court against a Rajasthan High Court order which on Thursday declined to stay the counting of votes which will be cast on Friday by the six MLAs, who had defected to the Congress Party. The High Court had also refused the interim prayer to put the Rajya Sabha poll results on hold till the petition challenging the MLAs' defection was disposed of.The plea before the High Court was filed as a public interest litigation by one Hemant Nahta (appellant) but the High Court declined interim relief prompting Nahta to move the top court the very same day. The matter was mentioned before a vacation bench comprising Justices MR Shah and Aniruddha Bose for urgent listing. "This is a matter of grave urgency. It concerns the Rajya Sabha election. Plea is being drafted against the order of today morning of Rajasthan High Court. Please list this," the appellant's counsel urged.The bench expressed its inability to list the plea and asked the petitioner to mention the case before the Chief Justice of India (CJI) and speak to the Supreme Court Registry."We cannot list it like this," Justice Shah remarked. .Six BSP MLAs had merged their party with the ruling Congress party .in 2019. Challenge to the same is pending before the High Court.The current plea stated that the the High Court's order of Thursday has erroneously paved the way for the defecting MLAs to vote for the Congress party in the Rajya Sabha polls, in violation of constitutional provisions. “The participation and consideration of the votes of the Six (6) MLAs of Bahujan Samaj Party in the upcoming biennial election of 2022 for the Council of States from Rajasthan will cause grave prejudice and irreparable damage to the whole democratic electoral process of the State and the rule of law,” the petition stated..Further, it was contended that the voters' faith in the electoral process would be dented by the illegal action of the MLAs, and this was aggravated by the assembly's secretary refusing to act on the representations challenging the six MLAs recognition as members of the INC."After getting elected, if the elected candidate shifts his loyalty and ideology, he not only betrays the electorate, but also pollutes the pure stream of democracy.. The voters were cheated by their elected representatives and whose faith in the system has been breached away by way of such a post-election somersault,” the plea said..The petitioner also relied on the Supreme Court's decision in Rajendra Singh Rana v Swami Prasad Maurya to submit that an MLA could not wear "two hats" of separately belonging to a national and legislature party. In this regard, it was stated that allowing the 6 MLAs to vote would amount to a fraud on the Constitution and encourage illegalities..Therefore, the petitioner prayed that the votes cast by the six MLAs' be kept in a sealed cover and not counted.The plea also prayed for directions to prevent the election results from being declared till the disposal of the petition.The petition was drafted by advocate Sidhartha Das of Atlast Law Partners and filed by advocate Tatini Basu..[Follow our coverage of today's hearing]