Chandigarh, October 10: More than a month after the Kapil Sharma show went off-air, the Punjab and Haryana High Court today dismissed as infructuous a PIL against Local Bodies Minister Navjot Singh Sidhu’s participation in the show.
The High Court made it clear that it was not deciding the writ petition on merit.Raising the matter of propriety involving a Cabinet Minister’s constitutional post, HC Arora — in his petition — had maintained he (Sidhu) should not participate in the TV show.
Arora also cited a full bench judgment of the Andhra Pradesh High Court, wherein the Bench had observed that a Chief Minister should not act in a film. The Bench had further cautioned that acting in films by a Cabinet Minister may also amount to abuse of his office.
Acting in a comedy show was apparently more serious than acting in a film, Arora had asserted.He had further argued that such conduct on Sidhu’s part, by the virtue of him being the Minister for Local Bodies and Cultural Affairs, would give rise to “conflict of interest”.
Besides, the minister was bound to enforce Rule 15 of the Punjab Government Employees Conduct Rules, 1966, according to which a government employee cannot engage himself in a private business. “How can Sidhu expect the government staff to avoid doing private business, when he himself was doing it?” the petitioner had argued.
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