Time to Hit the Roads: Sibal

New Delhi: Senior lawyer and Congress leader Kapil Sibal on Friday said it is time to hit the roads and tell the people what is happening in the country and it is the prime duty of the Congress to take the lead in the matter.

"The prime responsibility of the Congress is to galvanise the opposition and hit the streets and I will go to the people soon," said Sibal.

Sibal alleged that there is breakdown of constitutional and democratic values and even the high courts are not acting according to Constitutional bench judgments of the apex court.

"Maybe it is time that lawyers will have to take off their robes as when High Courts are not following Supreme Court judgments and go to public while adhering to non-violence," said Sibal.

The Congress leader criticised the High Courts for interfering in the Speaker's office and said that even Governors are not acting as protectors of the Constitution.

"We know what happened in Maharashtra as in the wee hours the Governor administered oath and President rule was revoked, in Karnataka and Madhya Pradesh the same thing happened as MLAs were lured and lodged somewhere else and later the elected government collapsed," he said.

The former Union minister said that when there is already a judgment in Bommai case that majority can be decided on the floor of the house then there is Nabam Tuki case of Arunachal Pradesh that the Governor will summon house if the Cabinet desires.

The Rajasthan High Court on Friday ordered a status quo with regard to disqualification notices issued to the 19 rebel Congress MLAs, even as it accepted a plea filed by MLA Prithviraj Meena, one of the petitioners, to make the Centre a party to the ongoing case.

Former Deputy Chief Minister Sachin Pilot and 18 other party MLAs moved the High Court following the disqualification notices to them by Rajasthan Assembly Speaker C.P. Joshi. The Speaker has been barred, for now, to act on the July 14 notices.

The High Court said that the petition is maintainable, but the matter is under the consideration of the Supreme Court.

Assembly Speaker Joshi had served the disqualification notices to the rebel MLAs, including Pilot, on the charge of "anti-party activities" soon after they skipped two Congress legislative party meetings.

The Speaker was first asked to defer action in the matter by three days last week, when the High Court began hearing the case in which the petitioner MLAs challenged Para 2(1)(a) of the Schedule X of the Constitution.