NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court is scheduled to hear on March 18 a joint plea filed by six rebel Congress MLAs. The plea challenges the State Assembly Speaker, Kuldeep Singh Pathania’s decision to disqualify them, under Tenth Schedule after cross voting in the recently concluded Rajya Sabha elections.According to the cause list of the top court, a bench led by Justice Sanjiv Khanna and Justice Dipankar Datta, would hear the plea of the six rebel MLAs on March 18, Monday. The six Congress MLAs (Member of Legislarive Assembly) who have been disqualified by Pathania are: Sudhir Sharma, Rajinder Rana, Ravi Thakur, Chaitanya Sharma, Davinder K Bhutto, and Inder Dutt Lakhanpal.These six rebel-disqualified Himachal Pradesh Congress MLAs, on March first week, knocked on the doors of the Supreme Court challenging the State Assembly Speaker’s decision to disqualify them.They were disqualified as they had cross-voted in the recent Rajya Sabha polls, for abstaining from voting on the Budget in the assembly, Parhania in his decision said.The State Assembly Speaker, Parhania, had in his order disqualified these six Congress MLAs, after noting that they attracted disqualification under the anti-defection law as they defied the whip. They thereby also ceased to be members of the House.But the six MLAs, in their defence, submitted that the mandatory seven days’ time for replying to the notice was not given to them.
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