Disqualified NCP MP PP Mohammad Faizal reinstated in Lok Sabha hours before SC hearing
AMN / New Delhi
The Lok Sabha secretariat on Wednesday restored the membership of Lakshadweep’s Member of Parliament (MP) Mohammad Faizal on the basis of a Kerala high court order staying his conviction in a criminal case. But hours later, the Supreme Court decided to examine the correctness of the stay order, making observations that added a new twist to the saga.
Faizal, a Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) leader, was sentenced to 10 years in jail by a trial court on January 11 in a 2009 attempt to murder case involving Mohammad Salih, the son-in-law of former Union minister and late Congress leader PM Sayeed.
But on January 25, the Kerala high court stayed the conviction on the grounds that it will force yet another election and unnecessarily burden the exchequer.
On Wednesday, a Supreme Court bench of justices KM Joseph and BV Nagarathna, however, stressed that the high court order will require a deeper examination on whether the evidence and nature of injuries was looked into by the high court as the victim suffered 16 injuries and that too by sharp-edged weapons and iron rods. “The high court saying election expenditure will be increased has nothing to do with the issue,” it added.
The bench also wondered if rules should be different between common people and lawmakers. “It is only in exceptional cases that a court should stay conviction. This should not be a run of the mill case where you ask and get a stay… There cannot be different rules for an MP or an MLA and a common man,” it said.
Hours before his petition was to be heard, the Lok Sabha Secretary General Utpal Kumar Singh issued an order setting aside Faizal’s disqualification. “In view of the order dated January 25 of the high court of Kerala, the disqualification of Mohammad Faizal P.P notified vide Gazette notification dated January 13 in terms of the provision of Article 102(1)(e) of the Constitution of India read with Section 8 of the Representation of Peoples Act, 1951 has ceased to operate subject to further judicial pronouncement.”
Under relevant provisions in the Constitution and the Representation of the People Act, a stay on the conviction in a case where the sentence is more than two years in jail renders the disqualification inoperative. However, if the top court vacates the stay, the lawmaker stands disqualified again.
The episode has assumed greater signifiance since it comes at a time when Congress leader Rahul Gandhi stands disqualified from Parliament following a conviction order by a Surat court, sentencing him to two years’ imprisonment in a defamation case. While the trial court stayed Gandhi’s jail term to enable him file an appeal, the Wayanad MP is yet to seek a stay on conviction from a sessions court for revocation of his disqualification, issued by the Lok Sabha Secretariat on March 24 — a day after his conviction.
The top court bench, when it took up the case, said that it would examine the evidence in the 2009 case to judge whether the Kerala high court was right in putting the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) leader’s conviction in abeyance on January 25 even as the MP argued that the effect on a lawmaker was irreversible if the stay was not granted.