SHILLONG: The State Government is planning to amend again the Act barring MLAs from holding the dual post as the Act allows MDCs from contesting Assembly and Lok Sabha polls only after resigning and not when they are still holding the posts of MDC.
It was on October 8 that the Law department notified the Prevention of Disqualification (Members of the Legislative Assembly of Meghalaya) Amendment Bill, 2015, to disallow MLAs from holding simultaneously two posts after Governor V. Shanmuganathan gave his assent to the Bill on the same day.
An official source said that while an MLA can contest Lok Sabha polls without first resigning as MLA, the present Disqualification (Members of the Legislative Assembly of Meghalaya) Amendment Bill, 2015 does not have this provision as the MDCs have to resign first before contesting either Assembly or Lok Sabha polls.
The attempt of the government to further amend the Bill is to make it at par with provisions being enjoyed by MLAs who relinquish one post only after the results after contesting Lok Sabha polls or MPs after contesting the Assembly polls.
The section 70 of Representation of the People’s Act, 1951 (RPA) has the provision that if a person is elected to both Lok Sabha and State Legislature, “then he/she can only hold on to one of the seats that he/she won in the election”.
However, the problem with the current Amendment Bill is that there is no provision for any MDC to retain the seat in case he loses either Assembly or Lok Sabha polls after contesting.
For example if any MDC of KHADC wants to contest the 2018 Assembly polls, he or she has to first quit the council seat, but if he or she loses the polls, then he or she cannot come back to the Council.
By the proposed amendment, the Government is planning to insert a provision in the Bill to allow MDCs to contest elections to Assembly or Lok Sabha without resigning, but after getting elected, they have to choose between the two.
It was after amending the Prevention of Disqualification (Members of the Legislative Assembly of Meghalaya) Act, 1972 that the Assembly on September 24 passed the Prevention of Disqualification (Members of the Legislative Assembly of Meghalaya) Amendment Bill, 2015 to prevent MLAs holding the posts of MDCs.
The 1972 Act has as many as 16 exemptions to escape disqualification, but with the passing of Prevention of Disqualification (Members of the Legislative Assembly of Meghalaya) Amendment Bill, 2015, the Government removed the exemption of MLAs holding the “office of Chairman, Chief Executive Member or other Executive Member or ordinary member of a District Council in an Autonomous District or any member nominated to such a District Council by the Governor”.
