Mr Chadha has termed the cancellation of the allotment arbitrary and unprecedented. (File)
New Delhi:
In a setback for AAP Rajya Sabha MP Raghav Chadha, a Delhi court has ruled that he has no right to continue occupying the government bungalow given to him after the allotment was cancelled. The court has lifted the interim stay granted to Mr Chadha, which means the Rajya Sabha Secretariat can ask him to vacate the bungalow at any time.
In a statement released after the court order, the AAP leader termed the cancellation of the allotment arbitrary and unprecedented, claiming that it was done on the orders of the “BJP to further their political motives and vested interests”. He also pointed to several other new MPs living in such accommodations and said he will take “appropriate legal action.”
Mr Chadha was given a type 6 bungalow in July last year and had requested the Rajya Sabha chairman for a larger type 7 accommodation, which was allotted to him in September that year. However, in March, the secretariat had withdrawn the allocation, arguing that the first MP was not entitled to a bungalow of that class.
The AAP MP was asked to vacate the bungalow, located on Pandara Road in central Delhi, and had moved the court at Patiala House in Delhi against the order. The court had granted an interim stay on April 18.
The Patiala House court on Friday lifted the stay, saying Mr Chadha could not claim an absolute right to occupy the bungalow.
“Plaintiff cannot claim that he has an absolute right to continue to occupy the accommodation throughout his tenure as a member of Rajya Sabha. The allotment of government accommodation is merely a privilege given to the plaintiff and he has no vested right to occupy the accommodation to continue to occupy the same even after cancellation of allotment,” the court said in its order.
The judge noted that the argument that the allocation, once made, cannot be withdrawn under any circumstances during the entire term of office of the MP “deserves to be rejected”. The court also pointed out that as a Member of Parliament, Mr Chadha is not entitled to the accommodation and his status is similar to that of a licensee.
‘Above his rank’
In June, the Rajya Sabha Housing Committee had said that the Type 7 bungalow was above Mr Chadha’s rank as a new MP and such accommodations are usually allotted to former Union ministers, former governors or former chief ministers.
The committee head had also pointed out that BJP MP Radha Mohan Das had also moved from a Type 7 to a Type 5 bungalow.
‘No notice’
In a statement, Chadha said he was wrongly targeted and victimized and slammed the BJP for trying to stifle political criticism from MPs like him.
“The cancellation of my duly allocated official accommodation was arbitrary, without any notice to me. It is unprecedented in the more than seventy years of history of the Rajya Sabha that a sitting Rajya Sabha member is being sought to be removed from his duly allotted accommodation, where he has been staying for some time and more than four years of it remain his tenure,” the AAP leader said.
Mr Chadha alleged that there were many irregularities and the steps taken by the Rajya Sabha Secretariat were in clear violation of the rules and regulations.
Targeting the BJP, the MP said, “The manner in which the entire exercise has been carried out leaves me no option but to believe that it has been carried out at the behest of the BJP to further their political motives and vested interests in order to avert political criticism from noisy parliamentarians like me.”
“This, along with my suspension as an MP, which was initiated by the treasury benches, leaves no doubt that the BJP is leaving no stone unturned to target rowdy MPs. “This amounts to unwarranted interference with the proper exercise of their functions as representatives of the House of Representatives and hits the nadir of vendetta politics,” he added.
