SC to examine court jurisdiction in Mahua case

AmitAnand.ChoudharyNew Delhi: Internal proceedings of the House to maintain discipline should not be amenable to judicial review, solicitor general Tushar Mehta, who appeared for the Lok Sabha secretary general, told the Supreme Court on Wednesday as it agreed to hear TMC leader Mahua Moitra’s plea against her expulsion from the Lok Sabha. Mehta told the bench of Justices Sanjiv Khanna and Dipankar Datta that there was no need to issue notice in the case and agreed to file a response to counter Moitra’s allegations.Questioning the maintainability of Moitra’s petition, Mehta said Parliament had its own sovereignty and was one of the three organs under the Constitution and it could internally manage disciplinary issues of its members through its in-house procedure which was not amenable to judicial review. “Any interference by one organ (judiciary) into the functioning of another organ (Parliament) will violate the separation of powers enshrined under the Constitution,” the SG said.The bench said it would examine all aspects, including the issue of the court’s jurisdiction and scope of judicial review.Appearing for Moitra, senior advocate Abhishek Manu Singhvi urged the bench to allow her to participate in House proceedings while the case was on. The bench said interim relief could not be granted at this stage and it would consider her plea on the next date of hearing. It posted the case for March.Singhvi tried to impress upon the bench how the action taken against Moitra was violative of natural justice by highlighting that she was not allowed by the committee to cross-examine the complainant whose statements were contradictory. Responding to the court’s query on whether she had asked for cross-examination, Singhvi told the bench that Moitra made the request not once but many times.The senior advocate further told the bench that proceedings in Lok Sabha were also against natural justice as the 495-page report of the ethics committee was supplied to many members of the House after 2pm and by that time, proceedings had already started. He said the decision taken by the House was not an informed one as members could not go through the voluminous report in such a short time.During the hearing, Singhvi admitted that the former MP had shared her login ID and OTP with her friend Darshan Hiranandani but said there was no rule or code of conduct to prohibit an MP from sharing the information. On December 8, 2023, Lok Sabha had passed a resolution to expel Moitra, accepting the recommendation of the ethics committee for her disqualification.