SC disposes of plea on merger of Rajasthan BSP MLAs into Congress

The Supreme Court on Monday disposed of a plea related to the merger of six Rajasthan BSP MLAs into the ruling Congress party.

A bench of Justices Arun Mishra, B R Gavai and Krishna Murari said the petition before the court by the BJP MLA Madan Dilawar against the HC's interim order of August 6 has now become infructuous.

Senior advocate Kapil Sibal, appearing for the Speaker, submitted that the final decision has been passed in the matter on Monday.

"It is submitted that the matter has been decided by the High Court. The remedy is to question the final order. In view of the final order passed by the High Court, this special leave petition has been rendered infructuous as it arises out of an interim order," the bench said in its order.

The matter has arisen out Speaker C P Joshi's decision of September 18, 2019.

Dilwar challenged the validity of the High Court's interim order of August 6, 2020. He claimed that HC had failed to appreciate that the Speaker straight away "illegally" accepted the request of six MLAs and allowed the merger of their party, i.e. BSP, into the Congress.

He claimed the Speaker had no jurisdiction to record a finding of the so-called merger, without giving notice to the Bahujan Samaj Party and without holding an enquiry as to whether the party has actually merged into the Congress or not.