Congress in wait & watch mood

​Hyderabad: With the state government and the Speaker of the Assembly remaining quiet on the recent Hyderabad High Court order restoring the membership of the two Congress MLAs who have been disqualified recently, the Congress is adopting a wait and watch attitude.

As there are indications that the two MLAs would not be allowed in the Assembly since they stood disqualified and expelled, the Congress is planning to move the court once again if the legislature does not honour the High Court judgement.

In the back drop of growing tension over the fate of the two MLAs- Komatireddy Venkata Reddy and SA Sampath Kumar - the Congress is weighing pros and cons of moving a plea against the Speaker. If it is convinced that the High Court has no power of review over decisions taken by the Speaker, then it may move contempt proceedings against the Assembly secretary.

The two MLAs are expected to meet party president Rahul Gandhi in Delhi on Friday and explain how they had been expelled from the Assembly and how the High court had restored their membership. They would also meet the Election Commission of India officials.  

Advocate Jandhyala Ravi Shankar and party senior leader Marri Sashidhar Reddy would also accompany them to the ECI. They would urge the ECI to take notice of the court directions and not to proceed on the notification issued by the Assembly expelling them.

Expelled MLA Komatireddy Venkat Reddy would seek party president Rahul Gandhi permission to take up a statewide padayatra. He would explain the reasons for the yatra and its necessity.

On the other hand, the Congress is keenly following the moves of the government on the court orders on expulsions. Though they expected that the Speaker would stay the expulsion and restore their membership of the Assembly, the former did not take any action so far.

Sources in the government said that the ruling party was not in a mood to implement the court order and is likely to take a legal recourse. It may go in for an appeal on the order of the High Court.

The sources say that government wants to delay the implementation as much as possible so that the expelled MLAs did not get any benefit of the court order. It may cite several reasons to delay the action.

Experts who have the knowledge of the affairs of the Assembly said that the government may tell the court in its appeal that there was a need to call a session of the Assembly to take action on the order. 

If court accepts this argument, the government would get at least six months’ time. The Assembly met for the last time on March 29 this year and it would have time till September 28 to conduct the next session.

The Congress which is aware of these tactics is planning to mount pressure on the government to implement the High Court’s order. It would proceed legally and politically on this. It may file a contempt petition in the court if the order is not implemented, sources in the Congress said.