HC allows AAP MLAs to move EC in Office of Profit case

New Delhi: The Delhi High Court on Thursday issued a "draft order" allowing 20 Aam Aadmi Party legislators, facing allegations of having held offices of profit, to move the Election Commission (EC) for permission to summon witnesses and asked the poll panel to decide it as per the law. 

A bench of Justices Sanjiv Khanna and Chander Shekhar said the draft order will be finalised after all parties gave their assent to it on Friday. 

The draft order came after conclusion of arguments on the pleas moved by the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) MLAs seeking directions to the EC to permit them to cross-examine the persons who had complained to the poll panel alleging that the legislators were holding office of profit when they were appointed Parliamentary Secretaries to various State Ministers. 

The MLAs had also sought that the Secretary General of the Legislative Assembly and concerned officers from administration and accounts departments and the State's Law Ministry be summoned as witnesses to prove that the MLAs did not hold 'office-of-profit'. 

The 20 MLAs, including Kailash Gehlot, have in their plea urged that they be allowed to summon the Delhi government officials as witnesses and sought clarification of the High Court's March 23 decision setting aside their disqualification by the poll panel. 

The High Court in its March 23 judgment had termed the poll panel's recommendation as "vitiated" and "bad in law" and directed it to hear the issue afresh. 

In the proceedings before the EC, the MLAs, represented by advocates Manish Vashisht and Sameer Vashisht, said that they should be allowed to cross-examine the complainants and also summon witnesses.
 
The poll panel, however, had said that the high court's order clearly meant that only oral arguments were to be heard. The March order had come on the legislators' pleas challenging their disqualification on grounds of holding office-of-profit. 

The MLAs were accused of holding offices-of-profit as they were appointed parliamentary secretaries to Ministers in the Delhi government in March 2015. This was soon done after they were elected to the Delhi Assembly. 

In September 2016, the High Court had ruled against their appointment as parliamentary secretaries. The EC had on January 19 this year recommended the disqualification of 20 AAP MLAs. 

The high court had on January 24 refused to stay the Centre's notification disqualifying them but restrained the poll panel from taking any "precipitate measures" such as announcing dates for by polls to fill the vacancies. 

The MLAs are Alka Lamba, Adarsh Shastri, Sanjeev Jha, Rajesh Gupta, Kailash Gahlot, Vijendra Garg, Praveen Kumar, Sharad Kumar, Madan Lal, Shiv Charan Goyal, Sarita Singh, Naresh Yadav, Rajesh Rishi. 

The other disqualified legislators were Anil Kumar, Som Dutt, Avtar Singh, Sukhvir Singh Dala, Manoj Kumar, Nitin Tyagi and Jarnail Singh.