Kolkata: The Calcutta High Court on Thursday disqualified senior political leader Mukul Roy from the West Bengal Legislative Assembly, finding that he violated the Tenth Schedule (anti-defection law) by joining Trinamool Congress after being elected on a Bharatiya Janata Party ticket.
A division bench held that Roy had lost his membership when he moved to Trinamool on 11 June 2021 — despite winning the assembly election earlier that year on a BJP ticket. The bench also set aside the decision of the Assembly Speaker, Biman Banerjee, who had declined to disqualify Roy.
Roy contested the 2021 West Bengal Assembly election as a BJP candidate and was declared winner. On 11 June 2021, he along with his son joined the Trinamool Congress. Following his switch, Roy was appointed chairman of the Assembly’s Public Accounts Committee (PAC), a move challenged by the BJP on the ground that he was no longer a BJP MLA and thus ineligible for that position.
The legal challenge began when BJP MLA Ambika Roy in 2021 objected to Roy’s appointment as PAC chairman, contending that the post was reserved for the opposition and that Roy had ceased to be a BJP representative. In 2023, leader Suvendu Adhikari filed a further petition asserting that Roy’s actions triggered the anti-defection provisions. The Speaker reviewed the submissions and declined to act, prompting the High Court to step in and ultimately rule in favour of disqualification — marking, reportedly, the first instance in West Bengal of an MLA being removed under the anti-defection law.
Suvendu Adhikari welcomed the verdict, declaring: “The Constitution has won. The Tenth Schedule has won.” He pledged to pursue other similar cases of alleged defections. From the Trinamool side, leader Arup Chakraborty criticised the BJP’s reaction, pointing to hypocrisy and questioning the timing of the “moral high ground”. Meanwhile, the Communist Party of India (Marxist)’s Sujan Chakraborty voiced approval of the ruling as a win for constitutional propriety and faulted the Speaker for not upholding the anti-defection law earlier.
