The Speaker's quasi-judicial role under the Tenth Schedule has often been criticised as compromising the neutrality of anti-defection adjudication. Discuss with reference to recent judicial interventions.

The Tenth Schedule, inserted by the 52nd Amendment Act, 1985, vests in the Presiding Officer the sole power to decide disqualification on grounds of defection, with Paragraph 6 declaring that decision final [1]. The design assumes an impartial umpire — an assumption repeatedly tested in practice.

Why the criticism holds

• Partisan location of the office: the Speaker remains a member of a political party, so defections into the ruling party are judged by its own nominee; PRS notes this has drawn the office into disrepute [1].
• No statutory deadline: the Schedule fixes no time limit, so inaction becomes strategy — delay has allowed defectors to continue as members of the House [1].
• Telangana illustration: Danam Nagender, elected on a BRS ticket, contested the 2024 Secunderabad Lok Sabha poll as a Congress nominee; the Speaker rejected the disqualification pleas, and the High Court's order came only in September 2026 — roughly 29 months after the disqualifying act [2].

Judicial interventions as corrective

• Kihoto Hollohan (1992) struck down Paragraph 7 and held the Speaker's "final" order reviewable for mala fides, perversity or breach of natural justice [3].
• Keisham Meghachandra Singh (2020) directed decision within a reasonable period, ordinarily three months, and urged an independent tribunal in place of the Speaker [4].
• Article 226 supplied the operative remedy in the Telangana case, where the Bench quashed the Speaker's order and backdated disqualification [2].

Limits of the judicial route Review is episodic, litigant-driven and slow; a backdated order cannot undo a term already served, and courts substituting their reading of "voluntarily giving up membership" risks hollowing out the Schedule's chosen adjudicator.

Judicial review has salvaged the law's credibility but cannot substitute for institutional reform. Writing a binding timeline into the Tenth Schedule and shifting adjudication to the President/Governor acting on the Election Commission's binding advice [1] would restore both promptness and neutrality — securing the representative mandate that Article 191 and the Schedule were meant to protect.