Maken said that the apex court had said that anyone aggrieved with the actions of the committee, formed in compliance with its direction, may approach the Supreme Court directly
Delhi Congress Chief Ajay Maken on Tuesday questioned the maintainability of a plea filed by the Aam Aadmi Party against a Centre-appointed panel's report recommending that the ruling party be made to pay an amount of Rs 97 crore that the government had spent on advertisements.
Maken said that the apex court had said that anyone aggrieved with the actions of the committee, formed in compliance with its direction, may approach the Supreme Court directly.
The Congress leader made the submission through an affidavit filed before Justice Vibhu Bakhru after a response was sought to the plea against the report of the three-member committee, set up to regulate government advertising.
The affidavit also said that the party has approached the court with "unclean hands and the petition is liable to be dismissed with exemplary costs."
The matter has been listed for March 20 next year. The AAP had challenged the report based on which the LG had ordered the recovery, from the party, of Rs 42 crore which the Delhi government had paid for the advertisements. The LG had alsodirected that the outstanding amount of about Rs 55 crore, owed to advertising agencies, be paid by the party and not the government.
The LG had ordered the Chief Secretary of the Delhi government to recover the amount from the AAP within a month.The committee, headed by former Chief Election Commissioner B B Tandon, in its report of September 16 last year, had held that the Delhi government had spent the exchequer's money on advertisements projecting Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal and his party in violation of the apex court guidelines of May 13, 2015.
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