Supreme Court rejects petition against J&K lieutenant governor’s power to nominate five MLAs

The Supreme Court on Monday rejected a petition challenging the Jammu and Kashmir Lieutenant Governor’s powers to nominate five members to the Legislative Assembly, Live Law reported.

The court, however, allowed the petitioner to approach the High Court.

The bench of Justices Sanjiv Khanna and Sanjay Kumar clarified that it had not expressed an opinion on the merits of the matter.

The Jammu and Kashmir Assembly has a strength of 119 members. While elections took place in 90 constituencies, 24 additional seats have been designated for areas in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir.

The lieutenant governor has the power to appoint five members under the amended Section 15 of the 2019 Jammu and Kashmir Reorganisation Act. Three of the five nominated members have to be women.

A party or an alliance needs 48 seats for a majority when the House has 95 members.

During the hearing on Monday, Abhishek Singhvi, the lawyer representing the petitioner Ravinder Kumar Sharma, argued that nominating legislators risks undermining the electoral mandate, potentially allowing appointed persons to negate the elected majority.

Singhvi contended that once the five members are nominated, the Opposition in Jammu and Kashmir will effectively have 47 seats, which is one short of 48 seats secured by the alliance of National Conference and Congress.

“It’s a basic structure issue,” Singhvi said. “When you have this...

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