18 MLAs case: Hearing to end on Thursday

On Monday, senior counsel P S Raman appearing for a few of the disqualified MLAs argued before the Supreme Court-appointed third judge Justice M Satyanarayanan that an honest dissention and conscientious objection cannot be held as voluntarily resigning from the party to attract disqualification.

Holding that the disqualified MLAs conduct would not fall within the acts that constitute a disqualification within the meaning of para 2(1)(a) of the Tenth Schedule, he said though the freedom of speech of a member is not an absolute freedom, the democratic right of voicing their opinion cannot be stifled.

He said the members, though elected on a party symbol, can voice their grievance or dissent over a scheme, but, not vote against the party whip. Merely, because you are opposing the leader, the Speaker cannot afford to use 2(1)(a) to disqualify members since such a use could result in the Speaker deploying the said provision to summarily disqualify members just to quell dissent, Raman argued.

On Thursday, following arguments by senior counsel Raman, Supreme Court lawyer Aryama Sundaram appearing for the Speaker is set offer his final remarks, after which the hearing in the case would end. Thereafter, the third judge would reserve his orders along with either offering a date or not.

On June 14, the then first bench of the Madras High Court comprising Chief Justice Indira Banerjee and Justice M Sundar passed a split verdict. While Chief Justice Indira Banerjee had upheld the decision of the Tamil Nadu Assembly Speaker, Justice M Sundar differed and set aside the disqualification order passed by the Assembly Speaker.