Ambika bhardwaj
Published On: February 01, 2022 at 15:19 IST
The Supreme Court in the Case of Ashish Shelar v. Maharashtra Legislative Assembly asserted that regulations enacted to carry out the power and authority of State Legislatures comprise “Law” under Article 13 of the Constitution.
The State contended that the Maharashtra Legislative Assembly Rules were not binding on the House and were similar to society bye-laws.
This submission was discovered to be without force and was thus dismissed by the Supreme Court.
Further, it was held that regulations made by the Legislative Assembly under Article 208 are “Process made by Law” for the purpose of Article 21 of the Constitution.
This was done as a part of a decision by a Bench of Justices AM Khanwilkar, Dinesh Maheshwari and CT Ravikumar.
They overturned the one-year suspension of twelve Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MLAs from the Maharashtra Legislative Assembly for allegedly mistreating Speaker Bhaskar Jadhav.
The Bench observed that when State Legislatures claim to exert such authority, the implementation of such a Law would have to be handled as a Law inside the meaning of Article 13, as the State will be acting under Article 246 of the Constitution.
This was done in response to the State’s assertion that under Article 208 of the Constitution, the Legislature could deviate from the Rules set by the House.
It was argued that such rules were similar to societal Bye-Laws that were not enforceable and can’t be considered as Statutory Rules.
However, the Supreme Court wasn’t satisfied with this argument.
Even though the Court had previously held that Parliamentary Law was of higher quality and efficacy than the Rules under Article 118 but this did not diminish the legal exposition that the Rules made by the Legislative Assembly under Article 208 of the Constitution are “Process set by law” for the purpose of Article 21 of the Constitution.
Also read: Nature and features of Indian Constitution