NEW DELHI: Raising questions about President Ram Nath Kovind's decision to okay the EC's recommendation to disqualify 20 AAP MLAs, party leader Ashutosh said the President should "contemplate if he has enhanced his stature in history" by the move.
Noting that former President K.R. Narayanan had returned for reconsideration questionable union cabinet decisions, the AAP leader indicated that President Kovind should have done the same with the Election Commission's proposal.
"President Ram Nath Kovind should himself contemplate if he has enhanced his stature in history as the President of the Republic of India by signing to disqualify AAP MLAs?" Ashutosh tweeted.
"Hope Mr President knows that K.R. Narayanan acted as the guardian of the Constitution, had courage of conviction to return the recommendations of the cabinet not once but twice."
"He was not a rubber stamp President, was a working President, a great President," he said.
Hitting out at Chief Election Commissioner Achal Kumar Joti, Ashutosh said his "misconduct" deserves to be debated.
"Time has come to think if ex-bureaucrats should be fit to be appointed as Election Commissioners.
"The (mis)conduct of Mr Joti deserves serious debate why men with independent integrity from the civil society should not be appointed as ECs," he said.
Kovind on Sunday approved the recommendation made by EC on Friday to disqualify 20 AAP MLAs for holding office of profit as Parliamentary Secretaries.