Supreme Court dismisses PIL on MLAs’ resignations over Telangana

Questioning the locus standi of the petitioner, the Supreme Court on Monday dismissed a PIL filed by former Member of Parliament M. Narayana Reddy seeking a direction to the Andhra Pradesh Assembly Speaker to accept the resignation submitted by 139 MLAs on the Telangana issue.

“Who are you? It is very strange that such a petition is being filed. You are not an MLA or MP. What are you? What is the public interest involved in it? Who gave you the right to present petition,” the bench told Mr. Reddy while dismissing the PIL.

The petition comes in the backdrop of reports that the Speaker had already turned down the resignation submitted by the legislators of political parties in the State.

Mr. Reddy in his PIL had contended that the resignation submitted by the MLAs on the issue of Telangana be deemed to have been accepted by the Speaker of the Andhra Pradesh Assembly.

According to the petition, the MLAs belonging to the Telangana irrespective of their political affiliations, had submitted their resignations personally to the Speaker who acknowledged the receipt of 139 letters in this regard but did not act on it.

The former MP had submitted that the issue involved important questions of the Constitution affecting its basic structure, namely the rights and privileges of the MLAs, their freedom of speech and expression and the dignity of the house. However, only Mr. Reddy has been named as a petitioner.

The petitioner alleged the Speaker has neither acted nor sent them to the Assembly Secretariat. The MLAs are from both Telangana and other parts of the State, he added.

“The arbitrary stoic silence of the respondent (Speaker of the House) has resulted in gross violation of Article 14, 19(1) (a) and 190 of the constitution,” the PIL said.

The court was told that resignations were submitted to the Speaker on December 10 and 23 last year.

However, the arguments failed to convince the Supreme Court which dismissed the petition on the ground that Mr. Reddy being neither a sitting MLA nor an MP had no locus standi to approach the court on the issue.