SC to hear Ahmed Patel's plea on October 15

The Supreme Court on Wednesday deferred for October 15 senior Congress leader Ahmed Patel's plea seeking a stay on further proceedings in the Gujarat High Court regarding the 2017 Rajya Sabha election.

BJP leader BalwantSinh Rajput, who lost the election to Patel, had challenged the 2017 Rajya Sabha election in the Gujarat High Court.

Rajput's counsel told a bench of Justices N.V. Ramana, Sanjiv Khanna and Krishna Murari that the high court has almost concluded recording of evidence in the matter. He also requested the top court not to stay proceedings.

The top court told the counsel of both parties to seek adjournment from the high court till October 15, the next date fixed by the apex court to hear the matter.

The top court was hearing Patel's three pleas including one appeal challenging the high court order which had dismissed his plea questioning the maintainability of Rajput's election petition.

Earlier, the top court had asked Patel to face trial on Rajput's election petition challenging the Election Commission's decision to invalidate the votes of the two rebel legislators.

Rajput had said that if the votes of these two rebel leaders had been counted, he would have defeated Patel.IANS