RAJ KUMAR
Ranchi, May 11: The Jharkhand Assembly today threw the ball in the court of the BJP for delay in the appointment of leader of Opposition for over last three years.
Advocate General Rajiv Ranjan, appearing on behalf of the Assembly, informed the Jharkhand High Court that Speaker Rabindranath Mahto has asked the BJP, the main Opposition party in the Jharkhand assembly, at least four times to recommend one of its MLAs to be the leader of Opposition. “Instead, it had proposed the name of Babulal Marandi, who is facing anti-defection proceedings under the 10th Schedule of the Constitution, and thus so far, not a member of the BJP,” he pointed out.
The AG also argued that the Speaker, who has reserved his verdict on Marandi, will hear anti-defection proceedings against other two JVM MLAs, Pradeep Yadav and Bandhu Tirkey, on May 18. “The verdict in all the cases will come simultaneously,” he pointed out.
Both Yadav and Tirkey had joined the Congress after the JVM suspended them for “anti-party activities”.
Abhay Mishra, counsel for one of the petitioners, Raj Kumar, argued that the Speaker cannot keep the issue of the leader of Opposition pending if the proceedings under the Tenth Schedule drag on indefinitely.
According to Mishra, hearing a batch of petitions, a division bench headed by Chief Justice Sanjaya Kumar Mishra fixed May 16 to decide two issues.
First, whether after the information given by the largest opposition party regarding its leader in the House can the Speaker delay to take a call on it indefinitely on the grounds of pending proceedings under the Anti-defection law.
Second, whether the high court can direct the Speaker to recognise the leader of Opposition in terms of the recommendation made by the largest opposition party in the House.
Incidentally, the Election Commission had recognised Marandi as a BJP MLA in 2020 and allowed him to cast his vote in the Rajya Sabha elections as a BJP member.
The high court is hearing a batch of cases, where a common question involved is that the Chairman of different statutory bodies like State Information Commission, Lokayukta, State Human Right Commission, etc. are not being appointed by the State Government for the last three years in absence of leader of Opposition.
Assembly Secretary Syed Jawed Haider appeared in the court today in pursuance of the high court’s May 3 order. The Secretary had been asked to explain to the court as to why the decision over the leader of the Opposition is taking so long.
Notably, the issue of deciding the validity of Babulal Marandi’s membership under the anti-defection law has been pending in the Speaker’s tribunal for the last three years. The BJP had nominated Marandi to be leader of Opposition in the Jharkhand Assembly after he merged his party (Jharkhand Vikas Morcha) with the BJP in 2020.
Notably, the Speaker had concluded anti-defection proceedings against Marandi in August last year and reserved the judgment amid political uncertainty following the Election Commission of India’s ostensible recommendation for Chief Minister Hemant Soren’s disqualification as an assembly member.
