DMK MLAs' suspension: Assembly video recording submitted in HC

The video recording of Tamil Nadu Assembly proceedings pertaining to en masse suspension of 79 DMK MLAs for a week from August 17 last year was today submitted in the Madras High Court.
Counsel for the Assembly Secretary submitted it in a sealed cover before a bench comprising Acting Chief Justice Huluvadi G Ramesh and Justice R Mahadevan during the hearing of PILs challenging the suspension.
The bench adjourned the matter to March 10 for further hearing.
The court had earlier sought the video recording of the proceedings after petitioners DMK Working President and Leader of the Opposition in the Assembly M K Stalin and his party MLA P T R Palanivel Thyagarajan contended even MLAs who were not present in the House had been suspended.

On August 17, 2016, uproarious scenes were witnessed in the assembly when DMK MLAs were evicted and suspended en masse by Speaker P Dhanapal for a week for allegedly disrupting the proceedings.
In his petition, Stalin submitted that a blanket resolution to suspend all the members of the DMK who had signed the assembly attendance register on that date was without any basis or material.

A majority of DMK members, including him, were not in the House when the resolution was passed by voice vote, he said.
The resolution was later modified to include the DMK members who had been present and those who had not signed the attendance register also, he contended.

He claimed that the action was completely arbitrary since even members who were not present in the House during the events leading to the eviction and those who had not even signed the register to mark attendance for the sitting were suspended by way of the impugned resolution.
Stalin said that the act of the Speaker was an unprecedented, motivated and biased which completely undermined democracy.
The petitioners also argued that the impugned resolutions were passed under rule 121 of the Assembly which is ex-facie unconstitutional as it provides for the grave punishment of suspension without any opportunity of hearing to the members in question.

In his counter affidavit, the Assembly Secretary had justified the en masse suspension saying the procedure followed in passing the resolution and decision taken by the House was in consonance with the provisions of the Constitution and the Assembly Rules.