ST status case against Mukul: SC rejects Govt pleader’s request
SHILLONG: The Supreme Court has fixed March 20 as the date for final hearing of the ST status case against Chief Minister Mukul Sangma.
Announcing this on Friday, the two-member bench of the Supreme Court comprising Justice Madan B Lokur and Justice Uday Umesh Lalit rejected the letter of request of the legal counsel of the State Government Ranjan Mukherjee to file additional affidavits.
Earlier, the lawyers of other respondents Suchitra Chitale and Ramesh Babu had sought adjournment of the ST status case for two more weeks.
However, with the Court fixing March 20 as the final date for hearing on the case, their plea was also not granted.
Tennydard Marak, who is pursuing the case, had objected to further adjournment as the matter was extremely urgent in nature.
Earlier on February 11, the Chief Justice of India had fixed March 13 as date of the next hearing of the status
On February 3, after the case pending in the Supreme Court was postponed 14 times since July 21, 2014, the petitioner Tennydard M. Marak had sought the intervention of the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court.
The lawyers of the petitioner Dr Rajeev Dhawan, assisted by Manish Goswami , had mentioned the issue of delay before the Bench of three Judges comprising Chief Justice H. L. Dattu, Justice A.K. Sikri and Justice Arun Kumar Mishra.
The lawyers of the petitioner had apprised the Chief Justice that the writ petition was getting delayed and the matter involved important constitutional Issues.
Later, the Chief Justice called for the file and directed the listing of the case for March 13.