Rajendra Singh Rana v Swami Prasad Maurya
Rule established
The question of disqualification under the Tenth Schedule must be determined as at the date of the act of defection. A Speaker who fails to decide a pending disqualification petition and instead acts on a later claim of split abdicates his jurisdiction, and that failure is itself correctable by the courts.
Facts
- A group of members of the Uttar Pradesh Legislative Assembly, elected on the ticket of one party, went to the Governor and requested him to invite the leader of a rival party to form a government.
- Petitions seeking their disqualification under the Tenth Schedule were filed before the Speaker soon afterwards.
- The Speaker did not decide those petitions.
- Subsequently a claim was advanced that a split had taken place in the original legislature party, which under Paragraph 3 as it then stood would have protected the breakaway group if it comprised not less than one third of the party.
- The Speaker proceeded on the basis of that later claim rather than deciding the pending petitions.
- The disqualification petitioners moved the courts, contending that the conduct of the members in petitioning the Governor was itself an act of defection complete at that date.
Issue
- At what point in time is the question of defection to be judged; and what may the courts do where the Speaker declines or omits to decide a pending disqualification petition.
Held
- The Court held against the defectors. The act of joining a rival party's claim to form a government, by petitioning the Governor to that effect, amounted to voluntarily giving up membership of the original party, and the disqualification was complete at that date. A claim of split arising later could not be used to validate what was already an act of defection, because the existence of a split must be established as at the time of the defection. On the procedural point, the Court held that the Speaker's failure to decide the petitions, coupled with his recognition of a subsequent split, amounted to an abdication of the jurisdiction conferred by Paragraph 6. Since a refusal or omission to exercise jurisdiction is not the same as an interlocutory step in the exercise of it, the bar on interim interference laid down in Kihoto Hollohan did not prevent the Court from intervening, and the Court proceeded to decide the matter.
Ratio Decidendi
A disqualification under the Tenth Schedule attaches at the moment the disqualifying act is done. If subsequent events could cure it, a defector would be free to arrange the necessary numbers after the event, and the Schedule would become an invitation to negotiate rather than a prohibition. As to the Speaker, the constitutional scheme entrusts him with a duty and not merely a power; a duty left unperformed cannot immunise itself from scrutiny by the very fact of non-performance, otherwise inaction would become the surest means of defeating the law.
How to use it in an exam
- Cite it for two distinct propositions, and keep them separate: defection is judged as at the date of the act, and failure to decide is itself reviewable.
- The second proposition is how the courts reconciled intervention with the rule in Kihoto Hollohan v Zachillhu 1992 that there can be no interlocutory interference. The distinction is between interfering with an exercise of jurisdiction and correcting a refusal to exercise it.
- Use with Keisham Meghachandra Singh v Speaker Manipur 2020, which supplied the time frame of about three months, to give a complete answer on the problem of Speaker's delay.
- Note that the split defence relied on in this case, Paragraph 3, was deleted by the 91st Amendment, 2003, so the numerical defence is no longer available at all. The case retains its value on the timing principle and on delay.
- Apply Ravi S Naik v Union of India 1994 alongside it, since the finding of voluntary abandonment rested on conduct rather than resignation.
Source
Source: (2007) 4 SCC 270; Constitution Bench; leading authority on the Speaker's failure to decide and on the point of time at which defection is judged; citation and bench checked against Indian Kanoon and reported sources, audit of 12 August 2026
This is an educational summary, not the judgment itself. Cite the reported version in professional or academic work.