Chandigarh, June 6, 2011. A Division Bench of the Punjab and Haryana High Court today dismissed an application field by the Speaker, Haryana Vidhan Sabha in which he had said that on the last date of hearing his lawyer never said that the speaker shall hear the disqualification petitions filed by Sh. Kuldeep Bishnoi, MLA & President Haryana Janhit Congress, against 5 HJC defector MLAs atleast 4 times in a month and that the order to that effect was wrongly recorded by the Court. He had prayed for correcting the order passed by the High Court by deleting those lines.Mr. Justice M.M. Kumar and Mr. Justice Gurdev Singh constituted the bench.
When the case was taken up, Mr. Rajiv Atma Ram, Senior Advocate with Mr. Sanjiv Bansal, Counsel for the Speaker said that he never made any statement before the court on the last date of hearing on June 2, 2011, that the speaker shall hear these petitions atleast 4 times in a month. He said that these were the oral observations of the court but it was wrongly recorded in the court order that this statement was given by him. He urged the court to amend and modify the order by deleting those words.
Mr. Satya Pal Jain, Senior Advocate with Sh. Dheeraj Jain, Advocate, Counsel for Mr. Bishnoi vehemently opposing the application submitted that the averments made in the application are contemptuous and amount to casting aspersions on the court. He said that, as a matter of fact, this statement was given by the counsel for the Speaker in the open court after taking instructions from the Speaker on phone. He also said that the order was pronounced by the Judges in the open court in the presence of all the counsels representing all the parties in the case. He also said that while the order was passed by the court on June 2, 2011, the present application was filed on June 4. Had there been any mistake on the part of the court, the speaker would not have taken 2 days to move the application. He said that this application is only an after though and an unfortunate attempt to wriggle out of his own assurance given to the court, with a view to delay the trial.
After hearing the counsels for both the parties, the court dismissed the application, observing that the order was dictated in the open court and that the court has also checked the dictation sheet of the steno. There is no mistake in the order and hence, the application is dismissed.