A hearing was held in the Punjab and Haryana High Court on the matter of giving place to 15% of the total MLAs as ministers in the cabinet of Haryana Chief Minister Naib Singh. The petitioner could not complete his arguments due to lack of time, so the court adjourned the case till February 4 for the remaining arguments. In this case, the High Court has already sent a notice to the state government and the Center and sought a reply.
It was alleged in the petition that the maximum number of ministers in the cabinet can be 13.5 percent, but Haryana currently has 14 ministers, which is a violation of the constitutional amendment.
Allegation of violation of constitutional amendment
Regarding this matter, Advocate Jagmohan Singh Bhatti filed a petition and said that under the 91st amendment of the Constitution, the number of cabinet ministers in the state cannot exceed 15 percent of the total number of MLAs in the Legislative Assembly. The maximum number of ministers in the cabinet can be 13.5, but Haryana currently has 14 ministers, which is a violation of the constitutional amendment.
All respondents including CM in the petition
In the petition, the petitioner has made the Central Government and Haryana Legislative Assembly as respondents, apart from Chief Minister Naib Singh Saini, Anil Vij, Krishnalal Panwar, Rao Narbir, Mahipal Dhanda, Vipul Goyal, Dr. Arvind Sharma, Shyam Singh Rana, Ranbir Gangwa, Krishna Kumar Bedi, Shruti Chaudhary, Aarti Rao, Rajesh Nagar and Gaurav Gautam.
The petitioner alleged that the ministerial posts and cabinet ranks distributed by the Haryana government are directly affecting the public. The number of ministers is being increased to please the MLAs and they are paid from the hard-earned money of the public.
Demand in the petition to remove ministers
The petitioner appealed to the High Court and said that due to there being more ministers than the fixed number, the additional ministers should be removed. Along with this, a demand has also been made to the High Court to stop the benefits given to the ministers while the petition is pending. When Manohar Lal resigned from the post of Chief Minister and after that Naib Singh Saini was made the Chief Minister and Saini expanded the cabinet, Bhatti had also filed a petition regarding this which is still pending in the High Court.
