In a huge setback to ruling- Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), the Election Commission has disqualified 20 MLA for holding office of profit.
The election watchdog has sent its report to President for assent.
The disqualification of the legislators is expected to pave the way for by-elections in Delhi. The AAP is looking it as political vendetta.
The controversy over the “office of profit” started soon after the party’s victory in the 2015 Assembly elections in Delhi. A petition filed by lawyer Prashant Patel sought the disqualification of the MLAs on the grounds that they were holding an ‘office of profit’ as parliamentary secretaries.
The MLAs’ pleas that the case against them be dropped were rejected by the EC in June 2017.
In August 2017, the MLAs appealed to the Delhi high court asking it to not allow the EC taking up the Delhi lawyer’s petition. They argued that their appointments to the post of parliamentary secretary were already quashed, in 2016.
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