Cuttack, Aug. 27: Alleged inaction of the Speaker of Odisha Assembly over applications seeking disqualification of four MLAs, who had quit the Sharad Pawar-led Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) and joined the Biju Janata Dal (BJD) over two months ago, has come under judicial scrutiny.

Orissa High Court has issued a notice to the Speaker, seeking clarification on the alleged inaction.

The four NCP legislators joined the BJD on June 5 in the wake of the failed “coup” by Rajya Sabha member Pyarimohan Mohapatra against Naveen Patnaik. At present, NCP does not have a single MLA in the state.

State NCP president Utkal Keshari Parida filed applications before Assembly Speaker Pradip Amat on July 6 for disqualification of the four MLAs — Amar Prasad Satpathy (Barchana), Ramchandra Hansdah (Saraskana), Prashant Nanda (Begunia) and Nabin Nanda (Gondia) — from acting as members of the legislative Assembly.

Subsequently, Parida filed four separate petitions in the high court. “Even though more than one month has passed after filing of disqualification petitions, the Speaker has not taken any action,” the state NCP president alleged.

The division bench of Chief Justice V. Gopala Gowda and Justice S.K. Mishra, before which the four petitions came up for admission on Friday, posted the matter for hearing after receipt of a clarification from the Speaker.

“The court’s order said — issue notice to the Speaker of Odisha Legislative Assembly through special messenger by Monday, list immediately after serving of notice,” petitioner’s counsel Gopal Agarwal told The Telegraph.

The petition stated that the Speaker’s failure to decide as soon as possible on the seeking disqualification went against the 10th Schedule.

“In a case in 2007, the Supreme Court had categorically held that the Speaker should dispose of the defection petition as expeditiously as possible otherwise the object of anti-defection law would be frustrated,” it stated.

The petitions contended that as the NCP had not merged with the BJD and the four NCP legislators had given up their NCP membership of their own will, the MLAs had gone against the Constitution and should be disqualified.