Madras High Court dismisses plea to prevent resigned MLAs from recontesting in the resulting bypolls

The Madras High Court on Thursday (September 24, 2026) dismissed a public interest litigation (PIL) petition, which sought to restrain the conduct of byelections to the Madurantakam and Dharapuram Assembly constituencies in Tamil Nadu until the disposal of the main plea to prevent the practice of MLAs resigning their post only to seek re-election from the same constituencies after joining other political parties.

The First Division Bench of Chief Justice Sushrut Arvind Dharmadhikari and Justice G. Arul Murugan rejected the PIL plea filed by Chennai-based advocate K. Suthan. It held that the court could not issue a direction to the Election Commission of India (ECI) to either prescribe a cooling-off period of five years before permitting the resigned MLAs to recontest in elections or insist upon them to bear the entire bypoll expenses.