New Delhi: A plea filed in the Supreme Court seeks the declaration of the possible post-poll alliance between the Shiv Sena, NCP and Congress in Maharashtra as “fraud” on the electorate for gaining power.
According to PTI, the plea is likely to be listed for hearing in next few days and it alleges that the Shiv Sena’s decision to drop out of the pre-poll alliance is “nothing but [a] betrayal of people[‘s] trust reposed in the NDA”.
After the BJP and Shiv Sena were given time to form the government in the state, governor Bhagat Singh Koshyari decided on Tuesday to recommend president’s rule even before the time given to the NCP to prove it had enough support expired. In a report to the president, the governor said that the formation of a stable government was impossible in the current situation.
The PIL was filed by Pramod Pandit Joshi, the spokesperson of the Akhil Bharat Hindu Mahasabha. It also sought a direction to the Centre and the state, asking them to refrain from appointing a chief minister from the emerging post-poll alliance of Shiv Sena, Nationalist Congress Party and Congress.
“The act of Shiv Sena, NCP and Congress are unethical and contrary to the constitutional scheme for staking claim to form government without legitimate alliance of political parties, which is far from the concept of the popular government,” the petition, filed through lawyer advocate Barun Kumar Sinha, said.
The plea said the post-poll coalition between two or more political parties was impermissible under the Constitution as it lacked peoples’ mandate. Political parties which have been voted out of power cannot stake claim to form the government by entering into such a coalition, it said.
“The governor is under constitutional obligation to consider concept of popular government to be provided. The present post poll coalition is based on power sharing concept of two political parties who have been voted out by the people,” the petition said.
The BJP and Shiv Sena, which fought the October 21 state elections in an alliance, secured 161 seats, enough to form the government. While the former won 105 seats, the Sena won 56 in the 288-member assembly.
The two parties entered into a logjam after the BJP did not cede to the Sena’s demand of sharing the chief minister’s post. The Congress and NCP won 44 and 54 seats respectively, in the last month’s polls.