oppn parties Karnataka Speaker Ignores Supreme Court Directive

News Snippets

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  • Supreme Court transfers Azam Khan's fresh ED bail plea to Allahabad High Court. The apex court declined to consider the Samajwadi Party leader's bail request in a fresh Enforcement Directorate case and directed that it be listed before a division Bench of the High Court on November 16
  • Two killed in Delhi building collapse; contractor booked. Two bodies were recovered after a building collapsed in Chawri Bazaar. Delhi Chief Minister Rekha Gupta said the contractor had been booked and the concerned junior and assistant engineers suspended
  • Uttar Pradesh voter rolls show a 2.4-crore discrepancy. A difference of approximately 2.4 crore names has been reported between the state's panchayat and rural Assembly voter lists. The Election Commission has ordered the two sets of rolls to be matched
  • Gujarat announces 3% dearness allowance hike. The state government announced a three-percentage-point increase in dearness allowance for government employees and pensioners ahead of Diwali
  • Sensex and Nifty post their strongest single-day gains in months. The Sensex surged 2,008.61 points, or 2.60%, to close at 79,310.01, while the Nifty 50 climbed 576 points, or 2.40%, to 24,536.60. Financial and automobile stocks led the rally, supported by falling crude prices and renewed foreign investor buying
  • Maaya Rajeshwaran reaches WTA-level quarter-final. The 17-year-old Indian defeated Poland's Weronika Falkowska 6-4, 6-3, becoming the first Indian woman since Sania Mirza in 2012 to reach a quarter-final at a WTA Tour-level singles event
  • Tanvi Patri reaches Youth Olympics badminton final. The 15-year-old defeated Japan's Yuzuno Watanabe in the semi-final, assuring India of a medal and becoming the first Indian badminton player to reach the girls' singles final at the Youth Olympics
  • India beat Pakistan 3-2 in SAFF Championship. India defeated Pakistan in a closely contested match, having led 3-0 before conceding two late goals. The victory was reported as a significant result for India's second-string side
  • India beat Japan 4-1 to win a record sixth Asian Champions Trophy. India recovered from an early deficit to defeat Japan in the final at Mohali, extending its record as the tournament's most successful men's team
  • The Supreme Court issued notice to the Centre and the Election Commission on a petition challenging Section 16 of the Chief Election Commissioner and Other Election Commissioners Act, 2023, which grants the CEC and Election Commissioners protection from legal proceedings for acts performed in their official duties. The petition argues that such blanket immunity could leave citizens without an effective remedy for alleged wrongdoing by the Commission
  • The Supreme Court told voters whose names were deleted from Delhi's draft electoral rolls not to be apprehensive about seeking re-enrolment through Form 6, after the Election Commission assured it that such applicants would not be prosecuted merely because their names had appeared in earlier rolls
  • Congress leader Rahul Gandhi opened the party's campaign for the 2027 Punjab Assembly elections with an Insaaf rally in Sangrur, Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann's home district, accusing the AAP government of failing to control drugs, gangster violence and corruption. Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge outlined six commitments, including a drug-free Punjab, protection of farmers, employment for young people and action against corruption
  • Rahul Gandhi accused the AAP government of running Punjab through a remote control from Delhi and questioned Bhagwant Mann's ability to tackle drug abuse, making personal allegations about the Chief Minister's conduct during their time together in Parliament
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Karnataka Speaker Ignores Supreme Court Directive

By Sunil Garodia

About the Author

Sunil Garodia Editor-in-Chief of indiacommentary.com. Current Affairs analyst and political commentator. Author of Cyber Scams in India, Digital Arrest, The Money Trap and The Human Hack

Ignoring the Supreme Court directive to decide on the issue today, the Karnataka assembly Speaker, KR Ramesh Kumar has said that he has to look into all issues and follow the Constitution. More particularly, he said he “cannot work at lightning speed” to accept or reject the resignations of the rebel MLAs.

This is astonishing. What is there to look into? The rebel MLAs were told by the Supreme Court to meet the Speaker in person by 6 pm today. They did so. Each one of them is reported to have personally told the Speaker that they have resigned. If their resignations were not in the correct format, following the apex court ruling, the Speaker should have asked them to resubmit the same immediately and should have taken the decision as per law. If he cannot work at lightning speed, he should not also work at bullock-cart speed.

There is nothing much the Speaker can do as per law. He has to accept the resignations. If the resigning MLAs are able to form a separate group as per the Anti-Defection Law (they do not have the numbers to do so in this case), the Speaker will have to allow that. If not, he has to accept the resignations and there will be by-elections in all the constituencies. But by sitting on the resignations and buying time by hiding behind legalities, Ramesh Kumar is trying to both frustrate the rebels and allow the alliance time to bring them around. If the BJP was guilty of allegedly engineering the defections and subverting democracy, the alliance, through the actions of the Speaker, is also guilty of delaying the due process of law.

It is clear that if all resignations are accepted and the count of MLAs shrinks in the assembly, the Congress-JD(S) government will not survive. The Speaker is allowing them time to try and get back as many MLAs as they can through his delaying tactics. One is sure that the Supreme Court is not going to overlook this. The Speaker’s actions are likely to invite adverse comments from the bench and they might even order him to do the needful, at lightning speed, tomorrow.