AAP MLAs may seek EC nod to quiz witnesses

New Delhi: The Delhi high court on Thursday issued a “draft order” allowing 20 Aam Aadmi Party legislators, facing allegations of having held offices of profit, to move the Election Commission (EC) for permission to summon witnesses and asked the poll panel to decide it as per the law.

A bench of Justices Sanjiv Khanna and Chander Shekhar said the draft order will be final-ised after all parties gave their assent to it tomorrow.

The draft order came after conclusion of arguments on the pleas moved by the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) MLAs seeking directions to the EC to permit them to cross-examine the persons who had complained to the poll panel alleging that the legislators were holding office of profit when they were appointed Par-liamentary secretaries to various state ministers.

The MLAs had also sought that the secretary general of the Legislative Assembly and concerned officers from administration and accounts departments and the state’s law ministry be summoned as witnesses to prove that the MLAs did not hold ‘office-of-profit’.

The 20 MLAs, including Kailash Gehlot, have in their plea urged that they be allowed to summon the Delhi government offici-als as witnesses and sou-ght clarification of the high court’s March 23 decision setting aside their disqualification by the poll panel.

The high court in its March 23 judgment had termed the poll panel’s recommendation as “vitiated” and “bad in law” and directed it to hear the issue afresh.

In the proceedings before the EC, the MLAs, represented by advocates Manish Vashisht and Sameer Vashisht, said that they should be allowed to cross-examine the complainants and also summon witnesses. The poll panel, however, had said that the high court’s order clearly meant that only oral arguments were to be heard.

The March order had come on the legislators’ pleas challenging their disqualification on grounds of holding office-of-profit.