SC to speed up PIL on ‘criminal’ contestants

Ahead of the crucial Assembly polls in five states, the Supreme Court on Thursday indicated that it will soon constitute a five-judge bench to determine an important question of law: whether a person facing a criminal case in a heinous crime can be disqualified from contesting Assembly or Parliamentary elections at the stage of filing chargesheet or framing of charges or only after conviction.

A three-judge bench had in March last referred to a larger bench a batch of PILs filed by the Public Interest Foundation in 2011, Delhi BJP spokesperson Ashwini Kumar Upadhyay and others on the question: “Whether disqualification for membership can be laid down by the Court beyond Article 102 (a) to (d) in the Constitution and the law made by Parliament under Article 102(e) ”.

On Thursday, senior counsel Vikas Singh, appearing for Mr Upadhyay mentioned before a bench of Chief Justice J.S. Khehar for expediting the hearing. The CJI said he would “soon constitute” a fivejudge bench to decide questions like whether people facing trial in serious crime cases can be allowed to contest and at which stage of trial, a lawmaker would stand disqualified.

THE ISSUE was raised in a PIL in 2011 seeking a direction to debar chargesheeted persons from contested elections. The matter was also referred to the Law Panel.

The Supreme Court on Thursday issued notice to Punjab government on a plea for quashing the state government’s policy to provide free electricity to the farmers. A Bench of Justices Madan Lokur and P.C. Pant issued notice on the petition filed by Safal Bharat Guru Parampara, a Hoshiarpur based NGO, seeking a regulatory mechanism for restricting the number of tubewell connections and a complete ban on the eucalyptus plantation. The NGO has challenged the order of the NGT rejecting its plea for a directive to the state government to stop providing free electricity.