SC to hear DMK's plea against disqualification of 3 AIADMK MLAs on May 6

The Supreme Court on Friday agreed to hear a plea by Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) party against the notice of Tamil Nadu Assembly speaker disqualifying the three All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam's (AIADMK) MLAs for supporting Amma Makkal Munnetra Kazhagam (AMMK) leader TTV Dinakaran.

A bench headed by Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi agreed to hear the plea on May 6.

This decision came after the senior advocate Kapil Sibal appearing on the behalf of DMK, pleaded for an early hearing in the matter.

Sibal also told the apex court that speaker of the Tamil Nadu Assembly P. Dhanapal himself had faced no-confidence motion while issuing a notice to three AIADMK MLAs, namely Rathinasabapathy, MLA of Aranthangi constituency, VT Kalaiselvan from Virudhachalam constituency, and VT Prabhu from Kallakuruchi constituency.

DMK president M K Stalin had claimed that the ruling AIADMK had sought to disqualify the three MLAs because the intelligence agencies had warned the government that retaining them in the party would have an "unfavourable outcome" in the bypoll to the 22 Assembly constituencies.

The chief whip of AIADMK S. Rajendran had on April 26 met Tamil Nadu assembly speaker P. Dhanapal and filed a petition to take action against three party MLAs on account of their "anti-party activities."

Rajendran has accused the MLAs of working for Amma Makkal Munnetra Kazhagam(AMMK) General Secretary T.T.V. Dhinakaran.

Out of 234 seats in Tamil Nadu assembly, the ruling AIADMK has 114 members, the DMK has 88, the Congress has eight, while the IUML and the Independent members represent one constituency each.

In 2017, a total of 19 AIADMK MLAs had submitted a letter to then Governor CV Raowithdrawing support to Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Edappadi K. Palaniswami. As a retort, Rajendran asked Dhanapal to disqualify the MLAs stating that their actions amounted to voluntarily giving up their party membership.

Tamil Nadu Speaker had on September 18 disqualified 18 MLAs belonging to AIADMK. By-elections for these 18 seats were held on April 18 this year.