Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla is poised to deliver critical rulings on the disqualification of rebel MPs from the Trinamool Congress and Shiv Sena-UBT before the upcoming monsoon session.
Key Points
- Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla will decide on the status of rebel TMC and Shiv Sena-UBT MPs before the monsoon session, which starts on July 20.
- Both the TMC and Shiv Sena-UBT have demanded the disqualification of their rebel MPs under the anti-defection law, arguing that individual legislators cannot merge with another party.
- The speaker has held meetings with delegations from both parent parties and their breakaway groups, and has consulted legal and constitutional experts.
- Precedents and past decisions by former Speakers are being examined to ensure legally sound decisions are made.
- The DMK has also sought separate seating in the Lok Sabha after breaking its alliance with the Congress.
Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla will take decisions on the status of the rebel factions of the Trinamool Congress and the Shiv Sena-UBT before the monsoon session of Parliament commences on July 20, sources aware of the development said.
The fate of the MPs, who have defected from TMC and Shiv Sena-UBT, will be decided by the speaker amid demands for their disqualification by their parent parties.
Consultations and Legal Scrutiny
The Lok Sabha speaker personally met and heard a TMC delegation headed by Abhishek Banerjee as well as the party's breakaway group.
A similar exercise was also carried out with regard to the Shiv Sena-UBT). Consultations with legal and constitutional experts of Parliament have also been done and they provided their inputs to the speaker to help him take the final decisions.
The monsoon session will begin on July 20 and will continue till August 13.
Past precedents, decisions taken by the former speakers/chairmen of Rajya Sabha in similar situations are also being examined so that informed and legally sound decisions could be taken considering all constitutional and legal aspects, sources said.
Seating Arrangements and Party Splits
Meanwhile, the Lok Sabha secretariat is learnt to have been examining the possible seating arrangements for the monsoon session.
Besides the rebel groups of the TMC and Shiv Sena-UBT, the DMK has also sought separate seating, away from the Congress, after the principal opposition party broke its decades-old alliance with the Tamil Nadu party and joined hands with the Tamil Nadu Chief Minister C Joseph Vijay's party TVK.
Altogether, 29 MPs got elected to the Lok Sabha on TMC tickets in the 2024 general election.
As many as 20 MPs broke away from the party and joined a little-known Nationalist Citizens Party of India (NCPI), a registered unrecognised political party headquartered in Howrah, West Bengal, and sought a separate seating arrangement.
The rebel group also expressed their allegiance to the Narendra Modi government and expressed their desire to join the ruling NDA.
One TMC MP passed away some time ago and the seat remains vacant.
Anti-Defection Law Arguments
In case of the Shiv Sena-UBT, a total of nine MPs got elected on the party tickets, of which six have joined the rival Shiv Sena, headed by Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister Eknath Shinde.
Both the TMC and Shiv Sena-UBT argued before the speaker that their rebel MPs should be disqualified as their actions fall under the anti-defection law.
The two parties argued that the anti-defection law may not be applicable only if two-thirds of the entire party walks away from its fold.
TMC general secretary and its Lok Sabha leader Abhishek Banerjee demanded before Birla that the rebels should be disqualified.
He also said that the claims of the rebels of having 'merged' with the NCPI were not valid, and as per the law, two-thirds of the entire party must merge with another party, not just individual legislators. Banerjee also submitted before the Speaker 20 separate petitions against the 20 rebels seeking their disqualification.
Shiv Sena-UBT also met Birla and urged him to share the demands submitted to him by the six rebel MPs of the party who have now joined the Eknath Shinde-led party.
Shiv Sena-UBT MP Anil Desai had said that they conveyed to the Speaker that the Tenth Schedule is clear: "Any group of a legislature party cannot merge into some other party on its own, even if they have a two-thirds majority".
In February 2023, the Election Commission had recognised the Shinde-led faction as the real Shiv Sena.
Shinde was the principal architect of the split in the undivided Shiv Sena in 2022 that brought down the Maha Vikas Aghadi government.
