The West Bengal Assembly Speaker has rejected a petition seeking the disqualification of 10 Trinamool Congress MLAs, including Ritabrata Banerjee, over alleged defection, citing procedural defects in the filing. The order does not decide whether the allegations are valid and allows the petitioner to submit fresh petitions in accordance with the law.
The petition was filed by senior Trinamool Congress MLA Sovandeb Chattopadhyay under the anti-defection provisions of the Tenth Schedule of the Constitution. The legislators named in the petitions include Ritabrata Banerjee, Akhruzzaman, Arup Roy and Sabina Yasmin, who, according to the report, left the Trinamool Congress after the 2026 election following differences with Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee.
The proceedings were handled by West Bengal Assembly Speaker Rathindranath Basu. The Speaker was required to decide on the matter by October 8 following directions from the Supreme Court. The petitions had remained pending before the Assembly.
According to the Speaker’s order, the main petitions were examined, but the documents attached to them had not been verified in the same manner as the principal filings. The Members of the West Bengal Legislative Assembly (Disqualification on Grounds of Defection) rules require every page of supporting documents to be signed and examined through the same procedure as the petition itself.
The Speaker observed that merely signing the annexures did not satisfy the legal requirement. Since the mandatory process had not been followed, the petitions were held to be procedurally invalid and were rejected.
The 10 petitions were heard together. Sabina Yasmin’s lawyer, Sumitabh Chakraborty, said during the hearing that the petitioner had argued that the cases could be heard jointly while allowing separate decisions in each matter. The Speaker rejected that objection and decided to hear the petitions together, while indicating that separate decisions would be issued for each petition.
The order also states that the 1986 rules do not provide for returning a defective petition to the applicant for correction. As a result, the existing petitions could not be sent back for procedural rectification and had to be dismissed in their present form.
However, the dismissal does not amount to a finding on the substance of the defection allegations. The Speaker made clear that the order does not determine whether the 10 MLAs actually violated the anti-defection provisions. Chattopadhyay has been given the liberty to file fresh petitions after completing the required forms and following the prescribed procedure.
The decision therefore settles the fate of the current filings without closing the broader proceedings. Any fresh petition will have to comply with the verification and documentation requirements identified in the Speaker’s order before the allegations can be considered on their merits.
