Dirty hands and filthy objectives

It is said that everything is fair in politics. But, it should not finally happen that politics which is associated with legitimate and lawful activities and policies that are used to gain and hold power in a government, is reduced to dirty tricks, including polluting primary parliamentary institutions of governance.

The petition by the independent Sanguem MLA Prasad Gaonkar before the

Speaker

of the Goa assembly against Vishwajit Rane, presently a non-member of the House, seeking disqualification for defying the Congress whip on the motion of confidence is an indicator that the BJP will stealthily sponsor any muddy game. The MLA who filed the petition is just a front. It’s not difficult to conjecture the back-stage actors. The exalted position of the office of the Speaker got dwarfed as this constitutional office kept the news suppressed within the four walls of the Speaker’s chamber, raising the doubt of connivance with the vested interests espoused by the petitioner.

Why, what and who motivated Gaonkar to petition the Speaker against a non-member of the House?

Supreme Court rulings have made it clear that any interested person, not only an MLA, is entitled to bring to the notice of the Speaker the fact that a member of the House has incurred disqualification under the Tenth Schedule of the Constitution, and the presiding officer is bound to act on the complaint. However, the jurisdiction of the Speaker under the anti-defection law is only in respect of disqualification incurred by a member of the House. The provisions are very clear on this point.

It is commonplace that a person invoking the jurisdiction of the courts or quasi-judicial authorities cannot be allowed to approach it with a pair of dirty hands. Let’s look at the propriety of conduct of the petitioner MLA, because the doctrine of unclean hands would apply if both, illegality and immorality, are present.

Illegality is apparent on the face of the petition as the person against whom the disqualification petition is filed is not a member of the House, on having voluntarily resigned from his membership, and the same has been accepted by the Speaker. A byelection is announced consequent to the vacancy arisen due to the resignation of the member of the House. Though redress of any grievance in matters of the Tenth Schedule are to be referred to the Speaker in the first instance, the person against whom disqualification is sought has to be a member of the House for the dispute to come under the purview of the Speaker.

Immorality is invited as the petitioner MLA is supporting the BJP-led government and the person against whom disqualification is sought is on the same political page as the petitioner. Vishwajit Rane conveyed the support to the motion of confidence through the implied conduct. Later, he joined the BJP to contest on the party ticket. There is a high probability that the petitioner and the member against whom disqualification is sought are hand-in-glove for an ulterior motive and attempting to misguide the quasi-judicial authority, ie the Speaker. This is assuming the Speaker is neutral, which can be accepted only with a pinch of salt. The immorality is also compounded because the petitioner MLA has kept silent for over four months and has moved the petition only when the high court, which is seized with a similar complaint from a group of MLAs of the Congress, is likely to announce its order. Under the present political equations, the petitioner makes a prayer to the Speaker in which the petitioner is genuinely not interested. On the other hand, the interest of the petitioner is to preempt genuine complainants from getting fair and timely redress of their grievance before the high court. This is a clear instance of absence of clean hands, clean minds and clean objectives. As there is nothing to indicate good faith of the petitioner and with the petition being against a non-member, the said petition is not entitled to be heard and the petitioner is not permitted for any relief.

If the petitioner MLA was clean, unprejudiced and serious about the issue sought in the petition, the natural course was to join hands with the disqualification plea already before the high court rather than knocking on the doors of another authority. It would be in the fitness of things for the office of the Speaker not to precipitate matters and keep away from political racketeering, which brings the chief of the august legislature into disrepute.

The writer is a former Goa state election commissioner. Views expressed are personal


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