Kochi, March 5 The Kerala High Court on Thursday dismissed a public interest litigation (PIL) seeking directions to the state legislative assembly to consider a complaint by CPI(M) MLA D K Murali against expelled Congress MLA Rahul Mamkootathil, filed by the ethics committee of the House.
A bench of Chief Justice Soumen Sen and Justice Syam Kumar V M held that the petition, filed by a lawyer, was not maintainable as the court cannot direct the Speaker of the assembly on how to conduct proceedings in the House.
The detailed order is awaited.
The petitioner, Kulathoor Jaisingh, stated that Murali had filed a complaint with the Speaker regarding Mamkootathil's allegedly inappropriate conduct as an MLA, seeking permission to raise the issue in the House.
The petition, filed through lawyer M R Sarin, claimed that the complaint was filed with "malicious intent due to political reasons".
"The Speaker of the Kerala Legislative Assembly, without considering the allegations in the complaint, has forwarded it to the ethics committee with an endorsement to examine it," the petition said.
It further stated that the petitioner had sent a representation to the Speaker to drop the proceedings against Mamkootathil, the MLA from the Palakkad assembly constituency, in connection with the complaint by the CPI(M) MLA.
The petitioner had also sent a reminder representation to the Speaker. However, no action has been taken to date, the petition said.
Therefore, Singh was compelled to approach the High Court seeking directions to the ethics committee to consider his representation to drop proceedings against the Palakkad MLA.
Mamkootathil is currently under investigation in three cases of sexual assault by three different women and is out on bail in all of them.