New Delhi: A day after the Supreme Court disqualified 13 MLAs of the Bahujan Samajwadi Party (BSP) for breaking away from the party and merging with the Samajwadi Party in the Uttar Pradesh Assembly in 2003, the Congress came all out against SP supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav.
While terming the development a ''constitutional crisis,'' the Congress demanded the dismissal of the Mulayam government in Uttar Pradesh. A party delegation met Governor T V Rajeswar in Lucknow on Thursday and handed over a memorandum to this effect.
''The SC ruling is clear. While the 13 MLAs have been disqualified since August 27, 2003, the rest of the 24 MLAs stand disqualified the day they handed over their letter of support for the Mulayam Singh government to the Speaker,'' UNI quoted Congress Legislature Party leader Pramod Tiwari as saying.
''In a bid to maintain democratic norms, the Chief Minister should immediately step down,'' Tiwari added. UP Congress president Salman Khurshid also took a stand against the Mulayam-led government and said it was "illegal''.
The SC Verdict
Although 13 MLAs of the BSP stood disqualified on Wednesday, the case of the 24 other BSP MLAs, who had also defected, has been referred back to the state Speaker.
The important fallout of the SC verdict is that with the disqualification of the 13 MLAs, the split in the BSP stands void.
However, Mulayam does not seem perturbed by the political noises. "My government is safe and it is a pro-people government. No other government has done so much for the people in the past," he said.
While stating that he respected the SC verdict, he added,"I will not quit . We will prove ourselves in next Assembly elections."
In a state that has seen multiple defections over the past 10-15 years, Mulayam has played rather safe and the SC judgement may not have any impact on the stability of the government.
In fact, in a floor test on January 25, the Mulayam Singh government had mustered the support of 223 MLAs in the 402-member Assembly. This means, that even with the disqualifications, his government stands strong.
Soon after the apex court's decision, there was varied responses from the political parties. While the BJP called for President's rule in the state, BSP General Secretary Satish Chandra Mishra said that the Mulayam Singh government should resign immediately.
The 13 MLAs had gone to meet the Governor of Uttar Pradesh on August 26, 2003, to announce their decision to break away from the BSP. A total of 37 BSP MLAs had finally broken away to form a separate political party - which was recognised by the Speaker - called Loktantrik Bahujan Samaj Dal and merged with the ruling SP.
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The apex court had on January 13 reserved its verdict on the issue. A five-judge Constitution Bench headed by Chief Justice K G Balakrishnan finished hearing appeals against the Allahabad High Court’s judgement quashing the Speaker’s decision to recognised the BSP MLAs as a separate party in the Assembly.
The High Court had quashed the Speaker's decision recognising them as a separate group in the Assembly and referred the matter back to him for deciding it afresh.
However, after the High Court verdict, five of the MLA had switched their loyalty back to BSP and the Speaker Mata Prasad Pandey had disqualified them.
These disqualified MLAs had also approached the apex court. Later during the pendency of the petitions, the apex Court had stayed High Court verdict and said the breakaway BSP MLAs will continue as a separate group in the Assembly.
The MLAs had defected from the BSP in September 2003 and the then Speaker Kesri Nath Tripathi had recognised them as a separate group which later had merged with Samajwadi Party.
The court had taken on record the submission of five MLAs who, after the HC judgement, filed affidavits before Speaker Mata Prasad Pandey owing allegiance to BSP.
The apex court's decision comes ahead of the crucial Assembly polls to be held in the state later this year.
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