HC adjourns 5 MLAs' case till SC decides matter

The Karnataka High Court today adjourned the final hearing on a petition filed by five independent MLAs challenging their disqualification from the membership of the Legislative Assembly by Speaker K G Bopaiah.

The adjournment came following the SC asking the lower court to defer the hearing till further orders and issuing notices to them on a petition seeking stay of the November 15 High Court order, allowing them to amend their petition.

“We will adjourn the matter,” the High Court bench, comprising Justices Mohan Shantanagoudar, S Abdul Nazeer and A S Bopanna, said as it took up the case for final hearing. The bench gave no date for the next hearing, observing: “We do not know when the matter will be closed (by the Supreme Court)”.

The bench adjourned the hearing till the disposal of the case by the Apex Court.

After asking the High Court to defer the hearing, the Supreme Court last Friday posted the matter for hearing to December 2. The five independent MLAs who challenged their disqualification are P M Narendraswamy, Shivaraj S Thangadagi, Gulihatti D Shekhar, Venkataramanappa and D Sudhakar.

On November 15, the Court allowed the applications filed by the MLAs, seeking to implead Speaker K G Bopaiah and Chief Minister B S Yeddyurappa in the case challenging their disqualification from the Assembly.

The independents, in their application, had prayed to amend the petition to replace the sentence “the petitioners had never left the BJP” with “the petitioners had not joined the BJP at all”, contending that the original sentence was an “inadvertent mistake”.