The Supreme Court on Monday refused to stay the order of the Himachal Pradesh Assembly Speaker disqualifying six Congress rebels, who had cross-voted in the recent Rajya Sabha polls in the state.
A bench of Justices Sanjiv Khanna and Dipankar Datta issued notice to the office of HP Assembly speaker Kuldeep Singh Pathania and sought its response to the plea in four weeks.
The bench said that pending adjudication of their plea, rebel HP Congress MLAs will not be allowed to vote or participate in the proceedings of the Assembly.
"On the question of by-election on six vacant seats, we will have to examine whether the elections which have been notified by the ECI are to be stayed during the pendency of plea," the bench said.
It posted the matter for listing on May 6 and gave the rebel MLAs a week to file their rejoinder.
The filing of nominations for six vacant assembly seats starts on May 7.
The six rebels -- Sudhir Sharma, Ravi Thakur, Rajinder Rana, Inder Dutt Lakhanpal, Chetanya Sharma and Devinder Kumar Bhutto -- were disqualified on February 29, for defying a Congress whip to be present in the House and vote in favour of the Himachal Pradesh government during the cut motion and budget.
Following the disqualification of the rebels, the House's effective strength has gone down to 62 from 68, while the number of Congress MLAs has shrunk to 34 from 40.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
Featured Video Of The Day
'Can't Say Everything Parliament Did During Emergency Is Void': Supreme Court In Preamble Case Strict Anti-Pollution Measures In Delhi To Continue For At Least 3 More Days Supreme Court To Hear Petition Seeking Ban On Websites With Jokes On Sikhs Amazon Employee Greets Friend At Wedding, Dies Of Cardiac Arrest "Violation Of Sovereignty, Abuse Of Power": Kanwal Sibal On US Report On Adani Group Indian Student In US Accidentally Shoots Himself Dead While Celebrating Birthday India Tops Representation In Interdisciplinary Science Rankings 2025 "Necessary To Change Job Definition": Minister To NDTV On World Bank Report Fact Check: Are Teflon-Coated Aluminum Utensils Harmful To Health? Track Latest News Live on NDTV.com and get news updates from India and around the world.