Hyderabad: The Hyderabad High Court’s order setting aside the expulsion of Con-gress MLAs Komati-reddy Venkat Reddy and S.A. Sampath Kumar from membership of the Telangana Assembly has turned a Congress versus Telangana Rashtra Samiti (TRS) battle into one between Assembly and High Court.
Whether the High Court order will be implemented remains to be seen, but Assembly secretariat sources say the court cannot interfere in Assembly issues, though it is not yet clear whether the state government will appeal against the court order.
Legislative affairs minister T. Harish Rao has refused to react to the order, while Assembly Speaker S. Madhusu-dana Chary has said he will not comment immediately.
Mr Harish Rao, however, has had a discussion with Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao at Pragathi Bhavan, and sources said the CM “did not take the issue seriously”.
Within the TRS itself, there are varying reactions to the order. According to a senior TRS MLA, since the expulsion of the two Congress MLAs is a matter for the Assembly, only the latter can revoke the expulsions. The expelled MLAs must, therefore, wait for a few days since the Assembly Budget Session was adjourned sine die in March, and unless there is an emergency, the state government need not convene the House for six months. This means the Assembly will meet again only in September.
Advocate Jandhyala Ravi Shankar, who is representing the expelled MLAs, said the question of whether the Assembly will revoke the expulsions is irrelevant, since the High Court has set aside the notifications of vacancy in the Assembly segments of the two MLAs as well as their expulsions.
TRS MLAs, however, said not even the government or the Assembly Speaker are empowered to restore the membership of an expelled MLA, and only the House has the power to do so.
