The Manipur Speaker, Yumnam Khemchand, on Tuesday heard the disqualification petitions against Forest and Environment Minister, Thounaojam Shyamkumar. However, he reserved the ruling.
The Supreme Court, in a ruling, directed the Speaker to dispose of the petitions within four weeks.
The Speaker’s tribunal, which is hearing the disqualification petitions against the Minister and seven other Congress MLAs directed Mr. Shyamkumar to file all additional documents, if there were any, within February 12.
Congress members K. Meghachandra and Fazur Rahim had filed the petitions against Mr. Shyamkumar, who had contested the 2017 Assembly polls as a Congress candidate and defeated Nimaichand Luwang of the BJP by a margin of 7,086 votes.
However, Mr. Shyamkumar joined the BJP on March 11 even before being sworn in as an MLA. He was inducted on March 15 as a Cabinet Minister.
Seven other Congress MLAs had joined the ruling BJP in phases. However, the Speaker did not recognise them as BJP MLAs and did not allow them to sit in the ruling bench.
In the last election, the Congress which was in power for three successive terms bagged 28 seats while the BJP secured 21 seats. With the support of other parties N. Biren could form an alternative Ministry on March 15, 2017.
The disqualification petitions against the seven Congress MLAs would be heard soon.
