Jailed MP Amritpal Singh moves High Court seeking to attend Parliament

Lok Sabha MP and jailed Khalistani separatist Amritpal Singh has moved the Punjab and Haryana High Court seeking directions to the Union and state governments to allow him to attend parliamentary proceedings, reported Live Law on Tuesday.

Singh, who won the general election in June 2024 from Punjab’s Khadoor Sahib as an independent candidate, is lodged in Assam’s Dibrugarh jail under the National Security Act. He is the leader of the Khalistan separatist organisation Waris Punjab De.

Khalistan is an independent Sikh nation sought by some groups.

In his petition, Singh said that he was being denied his constitutional rights as he has been forced to remain absent from parliamentary proceedings. This was being done with “malicious intent” so that his constituency goes unrepresented in Parliament and his seat gets vacant after 60 days of absence, the MP told the court.

The seat of an MP can be declared “vacant” if they remain absent from the House for 60 days continuously under Article 101 of the Constitution.

Singh told the court that if this is allowed to happen, it “will have serious consequences for the petitioner as well as for his constituency”, adding that he had already been informed about his absence from parliamentary sittings for 46 days.

“An MP under preventive detention has the right to attend Parliament sessions,”…

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