Chennai: The Madras High Court has said that a ban cannot be imposed on the by-elections in Madurantakam and Dharapuram. It also said that MLAs resigning from a constituency within a short period and then contesting from the same constituency for another party is an act that insults the people. The judges have advised the Election Commission to take appropriate steps to prevent this.
In the Tamil Nadu Assembly election held last April, 6 AIADMK MLAs elected from the constituencies of Madurantakam, Dharapuram, Ambasamudram, Perundurai, Karur, and Viralimalai resigned from their posts and joined the ruling party, TVK.
The High Court’s Chief Justice bench has imposed a stay on announcing by-elections for the constituencies of Ambasamudram, Perundurai, Karur, Viralimalai, and Tiruchi East, where election petitions are pending.
Since there are no pending election petitions, the Election Commission has announced by-elections for the Madurantakam and Dharapuram constituencies.
In this situation, shortly after the election results were announced, a public interest petition has been filed by a lawyer named Sudhan from Saidapet, Chennai, seeking a direction to the Election Commission to establish an appropriate procedure requiring the deposit of election expenses when they file nomination papers to contest by-elections, since they resigned from the MLA post for political reasons, disregarding the people’s verdict.
The petition states, “Because MLAs resigned from office for their own political reasons, by-elections have to be conducted using the public’s tax money. Appropriate procedures should be framed to hold them accountable for these expenses,” it says.
Furthermore, the petition also seeks a direction to examine bringing in a law that would bar those who, for political reasons, disregard the people’s verdict and resign within a short period after election results are announced from contesting elections for a specified period.
The petition also seeks an order restraining the conduct of by-elections in the Madurantakam and Dharapuram constituencies until this case is concluded, and restraining the Election Commission from accepting the nomination papers of former MLAs Maragatham Kumaravel and Sathyabama, who have been announced as TVK candidates for these constituencies.
Similarly, the petition also seeks a direction to the Election Commission to submit a report on the expenses required to conduct by-elections in the constituencies of Tiruchi East, Karur, Viralimalai, Perundurai, Ambasamuthiram, Madurantakam, and Dharapuram.
The case came up for hearing before the bench of Judges S. M. Subramaniam and Krishnasamy Govindarajan.
At that time, the judges said, “Representatives are elected on the basis of the people’s trust. But actions like this make a mockery of it. This is an act that humiliates voters. They resign after a short period and then contest again in the same constituency. The Election Commission should examine this; so far, there are no procedures to prevent this. In some extraordinary circumstances, the Election Commission should make a decision,” the judges instructed, adding that an interim stay on the election cannot be granted.
They also ordered that, since similar cases are already pending before the Chief Justice’s bench, this case be heard together with those cases.