EC hearing in office of profit case on May 17

NEWDELHI: The Election Commission on Friday said it will grant an oral hearing to the 20 Aam Aadmi Party MLAS in the office of profit case on May 17.

The EC, in a letter, invited the 20 legislators who were earlier disqualified in the office of profit case as well as petitioner Prashant Patel to appear before it “either in person or through authorised legal representative” at 3 pm on the date of hearing.

The announcement of the hearing comes in the wake of the Delhi high court order of March 23, which set aside the disqualification of the 20 AAP MLAS on the grounds that no oral hearing was given to the MLAS before disqual- ifying them. The court rules it was a “violation of natural justice” and EC’S recommendation to President Ramnath Kovind seeking the disqualification of the MLAS “was bad in law”.

AAP spokesperson Saurabh Bharadwaj said: “The party had always maintained that proceedings of the EC should be as per the principles of natural justice which means that the poll panel should not be prejudiced. We will wait and see if the EC is not biased against the AAP MLAS.”

AAPMLAALKA Lamba, whois one of the 20 legislators facing office of profit case, said: “In the high court, we had raised question that we were not given chance to explain our side. We will go there and put forth our arguments.”