An amendment Bill to stop the pension of six disqualified MLAs in Himachal Pradesh has been presented in the Himachal Pradesh Assembly on Tuesday.

Chief Minister Sukhwinder Singh Sukhu presented the bill on allowances and pension of the assembly members to be discussed in the House.

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After the implementation of the recommendations made in the Bill, the pension of two former MLAs, Chaitanya Sharma from Gagret and Devendra Kumar Bhutto from Kutlahar, will be stopped while the pension of four other former MLAs, Sudhir Sharma from Dharamshala, Rajendra Rana from Sujanpur, Indra Dutt Lakhanpal from Barsar, Ravi Thakur from Lahaul Spiti, will be stopped for this term.

According to this proposed Bill, those who have been declared ineligible as per Schedule-10 of the Constitution, their pension and allowances of the tenure of the 14th Vidhan Sabha can also be recovered from them.

Earlier this year, while the passing of the Finance Bill during the budget session of the Assembly in February, six members of the ruling party were absent from the House and had violated the party whip. On this basis, the Speaker of the Assembly had passed a decision to disqualify these six members from membership on the proposal of Parliamentary Affairs Minister Harshvardhan Chauhan.

Among the six rebel Congress MLAs, Chaitanya Sharma and Devender Bhutto had become MLAs for the first time.

Consequent to the disqualification of the six MLAs, by-elections were held on the seats of these 6 MLAs.

All the former MLAs who cross voted contested the elections on the ticket of Bharatiya Janata Party.

Out of these, four MLAs, who were elected for five years in December 2022, lost the by-elections. Only Sudhir Sharma and Indradutt Lakhanpal were able to win the elections.

In Himachal Pradesh, a leader who becomes an MLA once he gets a pension of about Rs 93,000. Similarly, every time a leader is elected as an MLA, an additional Rs 5000 is added to his pension.

If the Bill is passed, the tenure of these MLAs in the 14th assembly will be declared illegal. Congress will get it passed easily, as the ruling party has 40 MLAs in the Himachal Assembly which has the strength of 68 MLAs.