CHENNAI: A PIL was filed in the Madras High Court seeking to restrain the Assembly Secretary from allotting separate time slots or seating arrangements on the opposition side for MLAs of other parties who contested under DMK symbol.
The petition was moved by Coimbatore-based lawyer M Loganathan, who argued that such legislators should be considered as MLAs of the DMK and not the alliance parties they belong to in the official records of the Tamil Nadu Assembly.
The petitioner said the DMK won the 16th Tamil Nadu assembly election with 133 MLAs, of which 8 legislators are members of other political parties in alliance with the DMK. All the eight candidates, belonging to the MDMK, MMK, KMDK, and TVK, contested under the DMK’s ‘rising sun’ symbol, he said.
But the eight were given seating arrangements at the House as if they belonged to opposition parties. Since they contested under DMK symbol and declared as the returned candidates of the DMK, how could they be treated as MLAs belonging to opposition parties, the petitioner wondered.The plea is likely to be taken up for hearing by the First Bench headed by Chief Justice Sanjib Banerjee on Wednesday.