[ad_1]
Senior Advocate A M Singhvi, appearing for the Delhi government, mentioned the filing of the affidavit by the Delhi deputy CM listing out the numerous instances of the LG’s alleged unwarranted interference causing a governance paralysis in Delhi. He requested a bench of Chief Justice D Y Chandrachud and Justice Hima Kohli to take it on record and direct the Union government to respond to it before November 24, when a Constitution Bench is scheduled to take up the unresolved dispute over control of posting and transfer of senior bureaucrats.
Additional Solicitor General Sanjay Jain, appearing for the Centre, said filing of an affidavit not only seeks to make political slugfest of a dispute over constitutional issues requiring adjudicaiton, but marks an abuse of the process as it seeks a direction to the Centre to respond within a week prior to the commencement of hearing before a 5-judge Constitution Bench.
CJI Chandrachud-led bench appeared to agree with Jain as it said, “The Constitution Bench will be dealing with issues relating to law on services. Whatever is happening on the ground, if you put that on an affidavit and then ask the Centre to respond, it is akin to making it a political slugfest.”
The bench said it would freeze the pleadings and not ask the Centre to respond to Sisodia’s affidavit. “We will not ask them to file a response to the affidavit. We will deal with the constitutional issue and step back from the actual arena of conflict.”
When Singhvi said Sisodia has only stated the factual position to put the issue in context, the bench said, “You could have argued that before the Constitution Bench without filing an affidavit.” In his affidavit, Sisodia had alleged that the Centre through LG is making relentless unwarranted attempts to usurp the powers of Delhi’s democratically elected government, thereby throttling the federal system of governance.
[ad_2]
Source link