Former Union Finance Minister P Chidambaram today deplored over the mockery of Constitution in the newly formed Telangana state with the constitutional authorities are not discharging their obligations over the issue of defections.

Addressing Congress party workers at Gandhi Bhavan in Hyderabad, he expressed concern that constitutional authorities-Speaker and Court- are not discharging their duty by disqualifying such lawmakers.

He lamented that the Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao by encouraging such defections is not simply weakening the Opposition, but also weakening democracy by inducting elected representatives from other parties.

Referring to the delay in taking a decision on the matter of disqualifying Opposition members, who had switched loyalty to ruling TRS, he maintained that they should resign and seek re-election. He reminded that anti-defection law says if you leave your party you lose (House membership) and the Speaker should decide on this.

But, he said unfortunately in Telangana the Speaker did not discharge his constitutional duty. Since, they will not resign, he appealed the Speaker will discharge his constitutional duty and take a decision on whether defection took place or not. When people took the matter to Court, he regretted that the Court also so far has not discharged its constitutional duty.

A number of MLAs, MLCs and MPs of Congress and other Opposition parties have joined TRS since 2014 polls. The senior Congress leader said that he was particularly perturbed by the fact that despite the TRS having a comfortable majority, it “poached” MLAs, MLCs and MPs from Opposition parties.