Haryana Speaker rejects Congress notice on Tosham MLA Kiran Choudhry’s disqualification

Bhartesh Singh Thakur

Chandigarh, July 11

After Speaker Gian Chand Gupta rejected the Congress’ notice to disqualify Tosham MLA Kiran Choudhry on technical grounds, the party has filed a fresh petition regarding the issue.

The Congress’ petition, filed by Deputy Congress Legislative Party (CLP) leader Aftab Ahmed and party’s chief whip BB Batra, prayed for the declaration of Choudhry’s disqualification as a member of the House for voluntarily giving up the membership of the Congress and joining the BJP.

As written in the petition, Choudhry “stood disqualified” as per the 10th Schedule of the Constitution of India and the Speaker was yet to declare it.

Choudhry had won Tosham seat by a margin of 18,059 votes (12.4 per cent) in 2019. On June 18, she tendered her resignation from the primary membership of the Congress. The next day, she joined the BJP. Both Ahmed and Batra had written a letter to the Speaker on June 19, requesting him to declare Choudhry’s disqualification. “We have rejected their communication on technical grounds,” said Speaker Gupta.

The Congress’ application further read that Choudhry’s disqualification came at a critical stage where her actions reeked of subterfuge as she had joined the BJP.

Batra said, “As she is constitutionally supposed to be disqualified, allowing her to vote for the BJP would constitute an illegal act and irreparably harm the integrity of the democratic process.”

Meanwhile, Choudhry said, “They will do what they have to do. It doesn’t concern me anymore. The Congress is on a ventilator.”