NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Monday sought a response from Maharashtra's Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar and his supporting MLAs on a plea by Nationalist Congress Party (Sharad Pawar) questioning validity of the Speaker's decision declaring the group led by the rebel leader as the real NCP.
A bench of Chief Justice of India D Y Chandrachud and Justices J B Pardiwala and Manoj Misra issued notice to the Ajit Pawar group.
The court decided to hear the matter also with a similar plea filed by Shiv Sena's UBT's group against Chief Minister Eknath Shinde and other MLAs.
Sharad Pawar is uncle of Ajit Pawar and has founded the NCP.
On February 15, Maharashtra Speaker Rahul Narwekar had held that the NCP faction led by Ajit Pawar, who rebelled against his uncle Sharad Pawar and joined the BJP-Shiv Sena government, was the real Nationalist Congress Party.
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He had rejected the disqualification petitions filed by the rival groups seeking disqualification of each other's MLAs.
The Speaker had declared the events that unfolded between June 30 and July 2, 2023 were clearly in the nature of intra-party dissent within the NCP and the members of the party stood divided between two leaders. He had rejected the disqualification petitions against each other's group.
The Election Commission had on February 6, 2024 recognised the group by Ajit Pawar as the NCP and awarded it party symbol of 'Clock'.
During a brief hearing, senior advocate Abhishek M Singhvi, appearing for Jayant Patil and others of Sharad Pawar group, submitted that the matter was required to be considered urgently in view of the short remnant tenure of the state Assembly, which is to expire by November, this year.
"We will issue notice, all objections including on grounds of maintainability will be decided at final disposal," the bench said.
