SC moved over ordinance on convicted lawmakers

The Supreme Court was moved by a petitioner Wednesday seeking the quashing of the government's decision to bring in an ordinance to shield convicted lawmakers from being unseated in the wake of the court's July 10 verdict.

Petitioner advocate M.L. Sharma urged the court to declare the ordinance as "arbitrary and malafide" and against the basic structure of the constitution.

He also raised the issue whether an ordinance could be brought in to nullify an apex court judgment.

The apex court July 10 declared as unconstitutional the provision of the Representation of the People Act (subsection 4 of Section 8) that allowed elected representatives to continue as members of the elected bodies even after conviction in criminal cases provided they got stay of their conviction and sentencing within three months of being pronounced guilty.

Sharma questioned whether a bill that was before parliament could be made into a law by promulgation of an ordinance.

The reason political parties do not want to stop criminals from entering parliament and State assemblies is because they want to use them to win more seats, the petition said.