HC differs on Assembly dissolution
SANDESH PRABHUDESAI, PANAJI | 08 May 2002 22:03 ISTIn a significant development, both judges of a division bench of the Mumbai high court today passed two diametrically opposite orders on the crucial issue of Goa's midway Assembly dissolution.
For final decision, the matter has now been referred to the chief justice of Mumbai high court.
Goa governor Mohammed Fazal, on 27 February, had dissolved the state Assembly within 32 months, on the recommendation of the Bharatiya Janata Party government. The opposition Congress had challenged it.
Justice A S Aguiar, while quashing and setting aside the governor's order to dissolve the Assembly, stated that the order suffered from legal malafide and was not authorised by law.
Justice P V Hardas, on the other hand, upheld the Assembly dissolution by dismissing the petitions in this regard, stating that both the petitions had no ground to challenge the governor's order.
Former state opposition leader Luizinho Faleiro as well as another ex-legislator Jitendra Deshprabhu had filed two different petitions, challenging the dissolution order. Involving several legal luminaries, marathon hearings were held on the matter for almost a month.
The same division bench, on 24 April, had dismissed yet another petition, requesting the court to stall the process of fresh elections, scheduled on 30 May. The court had stated that Article 329 of the constitution bars any court from interfering into the election matters.
Reacting to today judgement, chief minister Manohar Parrikar said it has cleared the way to hold elections and the petition remains important only from the academic point of view. "Two different orders means no order", he added.
Both the petitioners, Faleiro and Deshprabhu, however were not available for comments.
