MLAs’ Disqualification Petition: HC disposes Off Plea Seeking Directions To Goa Speaker

The Goa bench of the Bombay High Court today disposed off petition filed by former Goa Congress chief Girish Chodankar.

The petition seeks directions to the Speaker of the state legislative Assembly to decide the disqualification of petitions pending against 8 legislators in a time-bound manner.

Chodankar’s lawyer Abhijit Gosavi stated that the division bench in its order observed that since Speaker Ramesh Tawadkar has stated in an affidavit that he would decide on petitions as soon as possible, and will not give any directions on the petition.

However, the major dispute of the plea was that the court should give directions to Speaker for deciding on disqualification petitions filed by Girish Chodankar against 8 Congress MLAs who shifted allegiance to the BJP in 2022.

In his submission, Tawadkar before the division bench stated that the high court can’t direct him to decide on the petitions in a time-bound manner.

Therefore, the court held that the Speaker acts as a tribunal and it can direct him to decide on the petitions and that it has to be done within reasonable time.

Currently, the court held that since the Speaker in his affidavit stated that he is already in the decision process of the disqualification petition filed by the present GPCC president Amit Patkar against the same MLAs, it’s not inclined to give any order.

Gosavi stated that while denying outer limit to decide on the petitions, the court stated that the statement made by the Speaker in the affidavit would be adhered to.