K'taka crisis: Venugopal says SC order raises apprehensions

Congress in-charge for Karnataka, KC Venugopal on Wednesday said the Supreme Court's verdict in the rebel MLAs case has raised apprehensions throughout the country about the internvention of courts in the process of legislat8ure after it held that dissident MLAs cannot be compelled to participate in the Assembly proceedings.

"Regarding the Supreme Court judgment, some apprehensions have been raised throughout the country about the intervention of the court in the legislative process. First, the apex court gave freedom to the speaker to take a decision on resignation and other things. That is okay. By saying the same thing there is a tenth schedule, a political party can give a whip to their members. If they are violating the whip, they may be disqualified. This is the spirit of the tenth schedule," he told the media.

"The Supreme Court said that they (rebel MLAs) may or may not come to the house. The court did not say that they have already resigned and they need not come to the house. They may come or may not. That means they are still members. Then where is the political party's power to give whips to our members? This raises serious constitutional question throughout the country. It will have serious consequences. I think we are going for various options to deal with that," Venugopal added.

The Congress leader asserted under the constitution, if a member voluntarily resigns from legislature, it attracts anti-defection law. "Our petition against them was on that ground, not on the whip ground. They will not get any relief. I don't think so. That decision is before the speaker."

"They have voluntarily given the membership with the purpose to support to sabotage this government and glove hand with BJP. There are pieces of evidences of BJP's hand in these MLAs resignation. This is a mass resignation. Our petition is not related to the Supreme Court judgment or tomorrow's whip," Venugopal said.

"Certainly, we will face the vote of confidence. We are confident that we will win," Venugopal told reporters here.