Uddhav Sena moves SC against LS speaker approving merger of six rebel MPs with Eknath Shinde group

The Shiv Sena (Uddhav Balasaheb Thackeray) on Tuesday approached the Supreme Court against Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla’s decision to approve the merger of six of its MPs with the Shiv Sena faction led by Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister Eknath Shinde, Live Law reported.

The Uddhav Thackeray-led faction’s lawyer mentioned the matter before a bench led by Chief Justice Surya Kant and sought an urgent listing of the plea. The faction’s functioning in Parliament had come to an “absolute standstill”, Live Law quoted the lawyer as having submitted.

The Monsoon Session of Parliament began on Monday.

The court said that it could neither promise to list the matter on Wednesday, nor Friday. “We will see”, Live Law quoted the bench as saying.

On Saturday, Birla had approved the merger of the rebel MPs with Shinde’s group.

The six of the Uddhav Sena’s nine MPs in the Lower House of Parliament had joined the Shinde-led faction on June 22. The Shinde Sena, which now has 13 Lok Sabha MPs, is part of the ruling National Democratic Alliance.

The Uddhav Sena had initiated disciplinary action against the rebel legislators.

On June 24, the Uddhav Sena contended before Birla that the rebel MPs, even if they constituted two-thirds of the party’s legislature wing in the Lok Sabha, cannot merge with another party on its own without the approval from the original party.

The Uddhav Sena...

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