HP High Court lists plea against CPS appointment for May 27

Our Correspondent

Shimla, May 22

The HP High Court has listed a petition challenging the appointment of Chief Parliamentary Secretaries (CPSs) for continuation of hearing on May 27.

A Division Bench comprising Justice Vivek Singh Thakur and Justice Bipin Chander Negi is hearing the matter on the day-to-day basis and after hearing the state government for three days continuously till May 22, it listed the petition for rebuttal arguments of the petitioners on May 27.

Today, Senior Advocate Dushyant Dave appeared before the court virtually on behalf of the state government and contended that the appointment of the CPSs was in consonance with the provisions of the State Act passed in this regard by the state Legislative Assembly and sought the dismissal of the petition.

The state government has engaged two Senior Advocates Dushyant Dave and Vivek Tankha to defend its case while Senior Advocates Maninder Singh and Ankush Dass Sood are representing the petitioners.

Una MLA Satpal Singh Satti and 11 other BJP MLAs had filed a petition in the high court alleging therein that no post of CPS existed in the Constitution or under any statue or Act passed by Parliament.

The petitioners contended that the state government had appointed six MLAs, namely Sanjay Awasthi (Arki), Sundar Singh Thakur (Kullu), Ram Kumar (Doon), Mohan Lal Brakta (Rohru), Ashish Butail (Palampur) and Kishori Lal (Baijnath) as CPS against the mandate of the Constitution.

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