In a dramatic sequence of events, former Union Minister and senior advocate Kapil Sibal has today withdrawn the petition filed by two Congress MPs against the Rajya Sabha Chairman and Vice President Venkaiah Naidu’s rejection of the impeachment motion against CJI Deepak Mishra.
Supreme Court dismissed the petitions of two Rajya Sabha Congress Parliamentarians Pratap Singh Bajwa & Amee Harshadray Yajnik as withdrawn. They had approached the SC challenging Vice-President M Venkaiah Naidu’s dismissal of the impeachment motion against CJI Dipak Misra. pic.twitter.com/VyP62FyWeW
— ANI (@ANI) May 8, 2018
According to reports, the Supreme Court dismissed the petition as withdrawn by Sibal. The petition was filed by Congress MPs Pratap Singh Bajwa and Harshadray Yajnik. Sibal had reportedly demanded a copy of the administrative order issued by the CJI for setting up the bench for hearing the matter. But the SC reportedly refused to oblige. According to reports, Sibal’s appearance representing the two Congress MPs was opposed by two advocates namely RP Luthra and Ashwini Upadhyay but the court had decreed that it was up to Sibal to decide whether to argue the case or not.
The five-judge bench was reportedly ready to hear Sibal on the merit of the petition but Sibal insisted that he will not argue unless he was given a copy of the administrative order. The court reportedly asked repeatedly about the purpose of Sibal obtaining the copy of the order and asked him to argue on the merit of the petition instead but Sibal insisted that he will only decide whether to argue after receiving the copy. When the court refused to provide the order, Sibal reportedly withdrew the petition abruptly.
According to reports, Attorney General KK Venugopal had asked that when 64 MPs from different parties have signed the notice of impeachment, how can only two MPs of one party have a grievance against the Rajya Sabha Chairman’s decision to reject it.
The five-judge bench of Justice AK Siri, SA Bobde, NV Ramana, Arun Mishra and AK Goel later dismissed the petition as withdrawn.
