The bench of Justice SM Subramaniam and Justice Krishnaswamy Govindarajan was hearing a petition seeking to create a mechanism for ensuring financial accountability of elected representatives who voluntarily and prematurely resign from their seats without legally recognized compelling circumstances.

The court noted that the current legal framework did not address the situation and called upon the ECI to consider framing guidelines. The court also orally remarked that such conduct of resigning immediately after elections should not be a mockery of democracy.

“The situation is not governed by law as of now. There is a vacuum as to whether the people's mandate is rightly utilised or understood, or whether an MLA or an MP, who resigns immediately after being elected, can be allowed to contest again…What is the guideline to deal with a situation where the very same MLA who resigned from the post is contesting again in the by-election? It should not be a mockery of democracy..It is nothing but insulting the people,” the bench orally remarked.

The court was hearing a public interest litigation filed by Advocate Suthan seeking directions to the Election Commission of India and the Chief Electoral Officer to initiate necessary legislative/regulatory measures to create a mechanism to ensure financial accountability of the MLAs who resign from their posts immediately after election without compelling reason.

The petitioner also called for introducing an Election Expenditure Security to recover the cost of the resultant bye-elections and to examine and initiate necessary legislative and/or regulatory measures to introduce a statutory disqualification or a reasonable cooling-off period to prevent elected representatives who voluntarily and prematurely resign from contesting subsequent elections for a prescribed period.

The petitioner submitted that the resignation of AIADMK MLAs immediately after the election for personal and political considerations has necessitated bye-elections, causing financial burden on the public exchequer.

The petitioner submitted that the present legal framework was silent on recovering costs from the resigning member or imposing any other form of accountability for abandoning the public mandate. He had thus filed the plea seeking to incur the expenses from the MLA who resigned.

The petitioner had also submitted that ex-AIADMK MLAs in Maduranthakam and Dharapuram constituencies who resigned from AIADMK and joined TVK were re-contesting in the very same constituency from the TVK party. He had thus sought interim directions to stay the bye-elections to the two constituencies till his petition was decided.

The court was however not inclined to stay the election process and noted that once the election process had begun, the court could not interfere in the same. At the same time, the court also noted that the issue needed consideration and asked the ECI why it could not issue guidelines in connection with the same.

At that point, Advocate General Vijay Narayan informed the court that the first bench comprising of Chief Justice SA Dharmadhikari and Justice G Arul Muruga had already heard the matter regarding the resignation of the MLAs and had reserved orders.

Taking note of the submission, the court directed the Registry to place the matter before the same bench and adjourned the hearing.

Case Title: K Suthan v The Union of India and Others

Case No: WP 37274 of 2026