The ordinance approved by the Cabinet overturns the landmark judgment by the Supreme Court in July
An ordinance hurriedly approved by the cabinet on Tuesday, to protect convicted MPs and MLAs from disqualification, has sparked off another political confrontation between the government and the opposition.
The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has asked President Pranab Mukherjee not to sign the ordinance, which skirts around a Supreme Court order that had said lawmakers will stand disqualified immediately after conviction.
"The President is not obliged to sign an ordinance that is unconstitutional. We oppose this ordinance," tweeted BJP's Sushma Swaraj, the Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha.
In response, Union Information and Broadcasting Minister Manish Tewari tweeted this morning that the BJP leader's advice was "amusing, surprising."
"The Constitutionality or otherwise of legal enactments are tested in Constitutional courts and not in the BJP's moat. Unsolicited advice is neither appreciated nor taken seriously," Mr Tewari said cuttingly.
The ordinance, which allows convicted MPs and MLAs to stay on, but without voting rights or salary, comes just ahead of a possible verdict by a Jharkhand court on the multi-crore fodder scam allegedly involving Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) chief Lalu Yadav, a loyal ally of the minority Manmohan Singh government.
If convicted, Mr Yadav faces disqualification from the Lok Sabha under the Supreme Court order of July, which said lawmakers could not stay on even if they appealed to a higher court against their conviction.
The ordinance is also likely to benefit Congress MP Rashid Masood, who was convicted last week in a corruption case. The CBI court will announce quantum of punishment next month and even if he is handed a jail term of more than two years, he will now not face immediate disqualification from the Rajya Sabha.
Law Minister Kapil Sibal has however clarified to NDTV that under the ordinance, protection from disqualification will apply only when the convicted MP or MLA has appealed in a higher court and the higher court has stayed the lower court's conviction.
The ordinance also does not interfere with the Supreme Court ruling that the convicted legislator cannot contest elections unless permitted by a higher court.