On Monday, the Supreme Court sought responses from Ajit Pawar and his 40 MLAs regarding a petition from the Sharad Pawar faction. The petition challenges Maharashtra Assembly Speaker Rahul Narwekar’s decision, which recognized the group led by Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar as the real Nationalist Congress Party (NCP).
A bench led by Chief Justice D.Y. Chandrachud, alongside Justices J.B. Pardiwala and Manoj Misra, acknowledged the request from senior advocate Abhishek Singhvi, representing the Sharad Pawar faction. Singhvi argued for an expedited hearing due to the imminent end of the state assembly’s term, which is set to expire in November this year.
The bench announced that it will consider the plea filed by Jayant Patil and Jitendra Awhad of the Sharad Pawar faction after addressing a similar petition from the Uddhav Thackeray camp.
"We will issue notice, all objections including on grounds of maintainability will be decided at final disposal. Liberty is granted to serve the other respondents with ‘dasti’ ,” the CJI said.
On February 15, Maharashtra Assembly Speaker Rahul Narwekar ruled that the NCP faction led by Ajit Pawar, who defected from his uncle Sharad Pawar’s camp to join the BJP-Shiv Sena government, represented the legitimate Nationalist Congress Party. Narwekar dismissed disqualification petitions from rival groups seeking to disqualify each other’s MLAs. He noted that the anti-defection law provisions under the Constitution's Tenth Schedule could not be used to suppress internal dissent, and highlighted that the Ajit Pawar faction held an "overwhelming legislative majority" with 41 out of 53 MLAs when the NCP split in July 2023.