CHENNAI: The Madras High Court on Thursday dismissed a public interest litigation petition seeking to stay the conduct of bypolls in Madurantagam and Dharapuram Assembly segments, where the bypolls were necessitated by resignation of two AIADMK MLAs-Maragatham Kumaravel and P Sathyabama respectively and are now contesting on behalf of the ruling Tamilaga Vettri Kazhagam (TVK).
Dismissing the petition, which was filed by advocate K Suthan of Chennai, the first bench of Chief Justice Sushrut Arvind Dharmadhikari and Justice G Arul Murugan said the court cannot grant the other relief sought by the petitioner to prevent the newly elected MLAs from resigning and facing the by-elections soon in the same constituencies.
The bench said it is for the Legislature to enact laws to the effect of granting the relief sought by the petitioner.
The polling is scheduled to be held on October 6.
During arguments senior counsel R Singaravelan, representing the petitioner-advocate K Suthan of Chennai. He sought the court to issue necessary directions to stay the by-elections being conducted in Madurantakam and Dharapuram Assembly constituencies until his petition is disposed off.
The counsel stressed the court to issue directions for the Election Commission of India to bring in safeguards for preventing newly elected MLAs resigning the posts and joining another party and seeking re-election.
Moreover, he sought the court to issue directions for making such resigned MLAs to bear the costs of conducting the bypolls because the financial consequences are forced upon the taxpayers owing to the resignation.
However, the bench questioned the counsel whether the court can legislate on matters which are in the domain of the Legislature to the effect of barring the defectors from facing polls and recovering the election expenditure, incurred due to the resignation, from them.
"The prayer is to ensure financial accountability but there is no provision in the law to make the MLAs accountable. How can the court issue directions on this?" the court asked.
Standing counsel for the Election Commission of India Niranjan Rajagopalan, representing ECI, submitted that the costs of polls cannot be recovered from the candidates in the absence of statutory provisions to do so.
He explained that the role of the commission ends with the declaration of the results of the polls and it is up to the Speaker to deal with matters like resignation of an MLA.
