SC stays disqualification proceedings against 3 AIADMK leaders for supporting Dhinakaran

The Supreme Court on Monday stayed the disqualification proceedings initiated by Tamil Nadu Assembly Speaker P Dhanapal against three AIADMK lawmakers for supporting AMMK leader TTV Dhinakaran.

A bench headed by Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi issued a notice to Dhanpal and sought his response over a plea filed by two dismissed AIADMK MLAs - E Rathinasabapathy and V T Kalaiselvan.

The plea sought direction to restrain the Speaker from acting on a disqualification notice for anti-party activities issued against them for supporting Dhinakaran.

This came after the three MLAs - E Rathinasabapathy, VT Kalaiselvan, and VT Prabhu - were served notice by the Speaker for disqualification.

They argued that the action of the Speaker was taken in an arbitrary manner. The plea said that no-confidence motion is pending against the Speaker and he could not adjudicate in a matter of disqualification.

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 had accused the MLAs of working for 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.