Congress to move Meghalaya HC against Speaker’s decision on merger of its 3 MLAs

Syllad | The Rising MeghalayaNovember 30, 2024

The opposition Congress has decided to soon file a petition before the Meghalaya High Court seeking disqualification of its three former MLAs for defecting to the ruling National Peoples’ Party (NPP).

The decision came after the Assembly Speaker Thomas A Sangma had on Wednesday maintained that his decision on the merger of the three Congress legislators to the ruling National People’s Party (NPP) still stands but everyone is welcome to appeal against the decision.

Sangma had said, “We are in a democratic setup, everybody has a right to appeal. I have given my own opinion. I have given my decision that decision still stands but everybody is welcome to appeal the decision.”

“Yes, every time appeal is done, we study the contents of the appeal. We refer it to our legal experts. We take legal advice accordingly we again give our reply,” he had stated.

However speaking to reporters on Friday, the lone Congress legislator and opposition chief whip Ronnie V Lyngdoh said that the party is still consulting the legal experts for moving the court of law against the decision of the Speaker.

Congress says Pyngrope may rejoin the party

“We will take up and we will file, a petition in the high court and then we will see the next course of action accordingly. Now, we are preparing it maybe within few days, we will file the petition because we are consulting legal experts and legal team had gone to Delhi to meet with the legal experts who are very conversion with this anti defection law,” he stated.

The Congress had filed two petitions – one against the two suspended MLAs – Charles Marngar (Mawhati) and Gabriel Wahlang (Nongstoin) and the other against Dr Celestine Lyngdoh (Umsning) – after they joined the NPP on August 19.

The party had also pointed out weak points of the three Congress MLAs in the letter they have submitted to Assembly Speaker on August 14 though one of the MLAs has not decided to join with the ruling National People’s Party (NPP) as he was attending the meeting of the party on August 16.

It had claimed that the two legislators, Gabriel Wahlang and Charles Marngar were suspended after they failed to come to the party meeting on August 16.