Office-of-profit case: Delhi HC says AAP MLAs cannot force poll panel to cross-examine petitioner
The high court said the Election Commission was relying on documents and not the petition of complainant Prashant Patel.
The Delhi High Court on Thursday said Aam Aadmi Party legislators accused of holding offices of profit cannot force the Election Commission to cross-examine the petitioner who filed a complaint against them, PTI reported. Last month, the poll panel had turned down the legislators’ request to cross-question Prashant Patel.
“As per the legal position, you cannot force Election Commission to call Prashant Patel and cross-examine him,” Justices Sanjiv Khanna and Chander Shekhar told the MLAs. “The controversy is very limited. The Election Commission is not relying on the complaint of the complainant, it was relying on the documents.”
The judges were responding to KV Viswanathan, who said the legislators should be allowed to cross-examine Patel and summon witnesses such as the secretary-general of the Legislative Assembly and officers from the administration department, the accounts department and the law ministry.
Senior advocate Arvind Nigam – the poll panel’s counsel – argued that this was a pure case of interpretation of documents and there was no dispute with regard to their authenticity.
AAP MLAs office of profit case: Delhi High Court today heard the arguments on 20 MLAs plea challenging Election Commission's order in the case and seeking cross examination of the complainant. Court fixed 9th August as the next date of hearing
— ANI (@ANI) August 2, 2018
The legislators were disqualified on January 19 after the Election Commission concluded that they held offices of profit as parliamentary secretaries to ministers in the Delhi government, posts they had been appointed to in March 2015.
On March 23, the Delhi High Court set aside the poll panel’s recommendation and asked the commission to consider each case afresh.
The poll panel had first issued notices about their appointment in March 2016. After that the AAP government amended the Delhi Members of Legislative Assembly (Removal of Disqualification) Act, 1997, to exempt the post from the definition of “office of profit”. Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal claimed at the time that the parliamentary secretaries were “working for free”, but Pranab Mukherjee, then India’s president, rejected the bill in June 2016. In September 2016, the Delhi High Court scrapped the appointments.
The case has been posted for hearing on August 9.
