Was Meira Kumar correct in rejecting Andhra MPs' resignations

Seemandhra Congress leader and Lok Sabha MP Lagadapati Rajagopal recently moved Delhi High Court seeking its direction to Speaker Meira Kumar to accept his resignation after she trashed it. Even as Speaker Meira Kumar today managed to surprise all when she rejected the resignation of the 13 Seemandhra MPs who had tendered their resignations protesting the Centre’s stand on Telangana, Kumar had done nothing that is constitutionally wrong. Rule 240 (1A and 1B) of The Rules of Procedure and Conduct of Business in the Lok Sabha states: (The Hindu) [caption id=“attachment_1180555” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  Lok Sabha Speaker Meira Kumar. Image courtesy PIB[/caption] Section (1A): “If a member hands over the letter of resignation to the Speaker personally and informs him that the resignation is voluntary and genuine and the Speaker has no information or knowledge to the contrary, the Speaker may accept the resignation immediately.” Section (1B): “If the Speaker receives the letter of resignation either by post or through someone else, the Speaker may make such inquiry as he thinks fit to satisfy himself that the resignation is voluntary and genuine. If the Speaker, after making a summary enquiry either himself or through the agency of Lok Sabha Secretariat or through such other agency, as he may deem fit, is satisfied that the resignation is not voluntary or genuine, he shall not accept the resignation.” As per data available online, in the 15th Lok Sabha, 13 members have resigned so far, seven passed away and Pranab Mukherjee ceased to become a member as he was elected as the President of India on 25 July 2012. What’s interesting is the list of 13 members who resigned. In all these instances of resignations, reasons varied from political to constitutional and needless to say that the Speaker considered their conditions as “voluntary or genuine”. Among them are Virbhadra Singh, former Congress MP from Mandi constituency in Himachal Pradesh, who had to quit his parliamentary post on 1 January this year as he became chief minister of the state. Akhilesh Yadav, who represented Kannauj and Firozabad constituencies in Lok Sabha, had to quit because he became the chief minister of Uttar Pradesh. Other members who had quit their membership in the current Lok Sabha to become chief ministers of different states are DV Sadananda Gowda (Karnataka), Mamata Banerjee (West Bengal) and Arjun Munda (Jharkhand). Similar is the case with former Tehri Garhwal Congress MP Vijay Bahuguna who is now the chief minister of Uttarakhand. On May this year, two JD(S) MPs HD Kumaraswamy from Bangalore Rural and N Chaluvaraya Swamy from Mandya constituencies in Karnataka respectively for their own political ambitions. Kumaraswamy had become the Leader of Opposition in the Karnataka assembly only to resign after three months in August. YS Jagan Mohan Reddy, the president of YSR Congress, resigned from his Lok Sabha membership on November 2010 after he left Congress. He got himself re-elected from the same constituency of Kadapa in Andhra Pradeshb representing YSR Congress on June 2012. Mekapati Rajamohan Reddy, who left Congress to join YSR Congress, left his Lok Sabha seat on February 2012. But he got re-elected to the Lower House from his new party on June last year. Porbandar Congress MP Vitthalbhai Hansrajbhai Radadiya who resigned from his party left Lok Sabha on January this year. However, he returned on June this year from the same constituency as a BJP MP. The last one to resign so far from the current Lok Sabha MP from Nagaland Chongshen Mongkosungkum Chang as he decided to fight an assembly bye-election in the state. It is unclear to which rule Rajagopal referred to when he claimed that the Speaker has no authority to not accept or act on the his resignation. Perhaps, the Congress MP missed the point that constitutionally even the Speaker has to be convinced about the real reason of his resignation. However, there is another side to this whole controversy. There may be ‘real reasons’ why Kumar chose to reject these particular resignations. If there are any ‘such reason’ where our imagination tends to lead, it may be said that there is nothing official about it. Questions will be raised if the decision was taken to protect Meira Kumar’s parent party—Indian National Congress—from any more trouble due to the Telangana-Seemandhra conflict. Only time will tell what guided the Speaker to take such a decision and whether it was appropriate as per the sanctity of her position and if it was not influenced by any partisan politics.