Goa continues to be a thriving constitutional laboratory, as amateur constitutional lawyers like me are left feeling shortsighted. This time round though it’s more of a joke that has been played on democracy and the constitution.
I have to apologize for the few options that I had penned down in last post, the Congress and its lawyers in Goa were thinking beyond their tried and tested methods.
This afternoon I got to learn about the propounding of new principles in the anti-defection jurisprudence of our country from none other than Margaret Alva on CNN IBN. I think it is high time she start a school of constitutional studies having experienced so many constitutional experiments in Goa being the State in-charge for a few years now.
Even a student of elementary English, let alone a lawyer, would know that the concept of an ‘alliance’ is foreign/ alien to the Xth schedule of the Indian constitution. This notwithstanding, the seasoned Speaker of the Goa Assembly restrained 2 MLAs of the Maharashtrwadi Gomantak Party (MGP) after entertaining a disqualification petition on the basis of a whip of the Congress Party. This is as crazy as it can get. And to be doubly sure that Mr. Kamat does win the vote, the Speaker put it to a voice vote and also exercised his casting vote.
After having got ‘alliances’ within the ambit of the Xth Schedule, the disqualification petition has been entertained on the basis of minutes of the meeting of the MGP party wherein apparently the party decided not to part ways from the Congress alliance but the 2 MLAs did so. As per this new theory, the Speaker ought to ask every kid who supports the MGP whether he would like to severe ties with the Congress. Furthermore, unelected political bosses can decide what MLAs would do on the floor of the House. Does the Speaker have the power under the Xth Schedule or otherwise to go into intra-party politics ?
Most significant of all is the theory that the Congress party could issue a whip asking “all those supporting the party” to vote in its favour. This is taking British constitutional philosopher Dicey’s theory of parliamentary supremacy a little too far and into the Congress party wherein Dicey claimed that the British Parliament could make a law saying that all pedestrians in France must walk on the left side of the road.
Why not the Congress Party issue a whip to the whole country to fall at Mrs. Gandhi’s feet ?
Mr. Parrikar has rightly told the Speaker on the floor of the House that he was murdering democracy. That they were to murder democracy was a forgone conclusion but the patently illegal manner and the naive manner of doing so did catch me by surprise.
I have all sympathies with Mr. Rajiv Pratap Rudy who was exasperated with the biased manner in which a CNN IBN reporter was interviewing him on the matter. Mr. Rudy shot back at one of his questions saying ” do you want to hear the facts or merely celebrate”.
The BJP is just wasting time going to the Governor now. A quia timet petition before the Supreme Court on Friday before the SC by the 2 MGP MLAs or the BJP would have won them this day. In any case, the order of the Speaker is so patently illegal that if they move the SC forthwith to stay the operation of the 2 restraining orders of the Speaker and also to seek a mandamus asking the Governor to convene a special session of the House in the next couple of days (like in the Jharkhand case) they might just succeed.
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Ninad - This is a new low for even the Congress, its time we rid the Executive of these Legislative and Gubernatorial Games.
[...] in the Assembly with the Speaker Pratapsingh Rane applying dubious interpretations of the law, Ninad over at Lex has the legal analysis. Offstumped makes the political argument that it is time to junk the present Parliamentary [...]
[...] in the Assembly with the Speaker Pratapsingh Rane applying dubious interpretations of the law, Ninad over at Lex has the legal analysis. Offstumped makes the political argument that it is time to junk the present Parliamentary system [...]
Ninad,is there any provision under any law to punish these men? I agree a ‘Judicial Slap’ alone mean nothing to Sonia’s Army.
PI.
[...] autonomy of States is checkered. With a pliant Governor in Goa, the Congress has shamelessly held on to power on more than one occasion making a mockery of democracy and the [...]
[...] autonomy of States is checkered. With a pliant Governor in Goa, the Congress has shamelessly held on to power on more than one occasion making a mockery of democracy and the [...]
[...] not so in our Constitutional Lab, for in this lab one can experiment the many ways in which the Constitution can be allowed to mutate without getting [...]
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