Mumbai : The Bombay High Court will deliver its verdict on Thursday (January 9) on a Public Interest Litigation (PIL) filed by Sunil Modi, a Shiv Sena (UBT) leader, challenging the appointments and delays in filling 12 Governor-nominated seats in the Maharashtra Legislative Council (MLC).
The controversy began in November 2020 when the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) government, led by Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray, recommended a list of 12 names for nomination to the MLC. However, the then-Governor Bhagat Singh Koshyari did not act on these recommendations, leading to allegations of an "illegal pocket veto."
The situation escalated when, in 2022, the new cabinet led by Chief Minister Eknath Shinde withdrew the pending list of nominees. Sunil Modi filed the PIL, arguing that this withdrawal was an overreach, challenging the legality of the Governor's inaction and the subsequent withdrawal of the nominations by the new cabinet.
The court, led by Chief Justice Devendra Kumar Upadhyaya and Justice Amit Borkar, has been examining the Governor's role in such nominations and whether there should be a differentiation between decisions made by different cabinets.
Maharashtra Governor CP Radhakrishnan had approved a new list of seven MLCs, just before the announcement of the Maharashtra Assembly elections. This move led to fresh legal challenges by Modi, who argued that the Governor could not have approved these names while the court's judgment was pending.