HC hears arguments on plea challenging CPSes’ appointment

Himachal high court on Wednesday heard the petition challenging the appointment of chief parliamentary secretaries for the second day today.

A division bench comprising justice Vivek Thakur and Bipin Chandra Negi heard arguments for the second consecutive day. Hearing on the case will continue on Friday. The double bench had earlier heard the case between April 22 and 24.

Eleven BJP MLAs, including BJP leader and Una MLA Satpal Satti, challenged the appointments of the chief parliamentary secretaries. In the petition, the appointment of CPS Sanjay Awasthi from the Arki assembly constituency, Sunder Singh from Kullu, Mohan LaL Brakta from Rohru. Ram Kumar from Doon, Ashish Butail from Palampur,

and Kishori Lal from Baijnath had been challenged.

All six were administered oaths of office by CM Sukhu hours before he expanded his cabinet on January 1, 2003.

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) had maintained in the petition that there is no provision for the post of chief parliamentary secretaries in the Constitution and under Article 164 of the Constitution of India, not more than 15% of the cabinet can be formed in the state, which is 12 in Himachal, but after the appointment of chief parliamentary secretaries, this number reaches 18.

A division bench had on January 4 passed an interim order debarring the six secretaries appointed by the CM from availing the facilities given to cabinet rank minister.

Another petition argued the acts related to the appointment of parliamentary secretaries in

Himachal and Assam are similar. The SC has declared the Act related to the appointment of parliamentary secretaries in Assam and Manipur illegal.

The petition also demanded the repeal of the Himachal Parliamentary Secretary (Appointment, Salary, Allowances, Powers, Privileges and Facilities) Act, 2006. The state government has deployed six CPSs under this Act.

In a bid to buy time, the Congress government filed the transfer petition in the SC under Article 139A of the Constitution. It has requested that the petition of Kalpana Devi vs Government of Himachal Pradesh and others, Satpal Singh Satti vs Government of Himachal and others, and NGO People for Responsible Governance vs state government and others, be transferred to the apex court. However, the request was turned down.