The Rajasthan High Court on Tuesday reserved its judgement on the plea filed by rebel Congress leader Sachin Pilot and 18 other dissident Congress MLAs against their disqualification notices, Live Law reported. The final verdict will now be delivered on July 24.

Chief Justice Indrajit Mahanty and Justice Prakash Gupta asked the Speaker to not take a decision on the disqualification notices till the final verdict. The time given to the rebel lawmakers to reply was set to expire at 5.30 pm on Tuesday.

Senior advocate Mukul Rohatgi, appearing for Pilot and the rebel legislators, argued that less time was granted to them to submit their response than as stated in the rules. “The proceedings reek of malafides,” he said. “Mind you, we are in the middle of Covid-19 and only three days time [has been] given for reply.”

Rohatgi added that according to the legislative rules of the Assembly, a response can be given “within seven days or such extended period as may be”. “Normal manner of construction is that Speaker can extend time for reply,” he argued. “If that is the scheme, why the Speaker granted only three days time for reply?”

The advocate contended that these factors show “mala fides on the part of the Speaker” who is “acting with a foregone conclusion in mind”. “There is a clear case of breach of principles of natural justice, especially when the consequences of the notice are drastic, not just the disqualification of members, but adverse impact on a functioning democracy,” he said. “The Speaker was acting with undue haste. The Speaker has not given any satisfactory explanation before the Court about his actions.”

On Monday, the judges had observed that a whip can be issued only for an Assembly session but not with respect to a party meeting. Advocate Harish Salve, arguing on behalf of team Pilot, had said the a party member was “free to defy the party whip direction” outside the Assembly and it did not constitute defection. “Intra-party dissent, however shrill it may be, until the moment it goes to the extent of supporting another party, cannot be a ground to even start disqualification proceedings,” Salve had said.

Senior advocate and Congress leader Abhishek Manu Singhvi, representing the Speaker, had argued that courts have no jurisdiction over the disqualification of any member. “The Speaker’s decision to initiate disqualification proceedings are not amenable to judicial review,” he added. “Can Speaker order that proceedings of the court be video recorded?”

The case

On July 17, the court had also allowed Congress chief whip Mahesh Joshi, who had filed the plea for disqualification, to be impleaded as a party in the case and asked him to file his reply by the next day.

The notices were served to Pilot and the rebel leaders after the MLAs had defied a whip to attend two Congress Legislature Party meetings to resolve the political crisis in the state. However, the MLAs said that a party whip applies only when the Assembly is in session. In their petition, the legislators sought to quash the notices, arguing that they had neither given up their membership of the House nor did their failure to attend two Congress meetings makes them liable for disqualification on the ground of defection. It added that an elected representative of the people cannot be removed from his post on the whims and fancies of his party’s leadership.

Pilot was sacked as deputy chief minister and the president of the state unit of the party on July 14 after he rebelled against Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot.