Assembly resolutions are malicious, arbitrary: Supreme Court sets aside suspension of 12 Maharashtra BJP MLAs

The Supreme Court on Friday set aside the one-year suspension of 12 Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MLAs from the Maharashtra Legislative Assembly for allegedly abusing and manhandling Speaker Bhaskar Jadhav [Ashish Shelar v. Maharashtra Legislative Assembly]..A Bench of Justices AM Khanwilkar, Dinesh Maheshwari and CT Ravikumar held that the suspension could only be limited to the duration of the Monsoon Session of the Assembly."We allow these petitions. Assembly resolutions are malicious in eyes of law, declared to be ineffective in law. The petitioners are now declared to be entitled to benefits of Members of Legislative Assembly," the order stated..Ashish Shelar and eleven other MLAs - Dr Sanjay Kute, Abhimanyu Pawar, Girish Mahajan, Atul Bhatkhalkar, Harish Pimple, Jaikumar Rawal, Yogesh Sagar, Narayan Kuche, Bunty Bhangdiya, Parag Alwani and Ram Satpute -were suspended from the Maharashtra Legislative Assembly for allegedly abusing and manhandling Speaker Bhaskar Jadhav in his chambers on the first day of the Monsoon Session 2021..The petitioner MLAs had challenged their suspension claiming violation of Article 14 and principles of natural justice. They claimed to have tendered an apology to the Speaker, while categorically denying the use of foul language and accusations of manhandling. They had sought CCTV footage of the incident in question, but were refused by the Deputy Speaker citing house rules.."The impugned resolution has been passed in abject violation of Article 14 of the Constitution of India in as much as no opportunity of hearing or at least furnishing their written explanation was given to the Petitioners. Further, a perusal of the impugned resolution shows that there has been utter non-application of mind in as much there was no material available for identifying the 12 MLA’s from a large crowd of people," the petitioners had submitted..On a previous date of hearing, the Court had described the move as being prima facie unconstitutional since such a suspension cannot operate beyond six months owing to a constitutional bar. It was pointed out that as per the Constitution, the explicit outer limit for an MLA to be absent from his seat is 60 days, after which the seat is deemed to be vacated.The Court had reserved its judgment in the matter on January 19..Senior Advocates Mahesh Jethmalani, Mukul Rohatgi, Harish Salve, Neeraj Kishan Kaul and Siddharth Bhatnagar represented the petitioner MLAs along with advocates Mugdha Pande, Ravi Sharma, Siddharth Dharmadhikari, Abhikalp Pratap Singh and Utsav Trivedi..[Read Judgment]."Dangerous, unconstitutional:" Supreme Court on decision by Maharashtra Assembly to suspend 12 BJP MLAs for a year