Supreme Court stays Madras High Court order on TVK MLA Sethupathi, terms it ‘atrocious’
The Supreme Court on Wednesday (May 13, 2026) found a Madras High Court intervention barring Tamil Nadu’s ruling Tamilaga Vettri Kazhagam (TVK) party MLA R. Sreenivasa Sethupathi from casting his vote in the floor test on May 13 as ‘atrocious’.
The apex court stayed the operation of the High Court order, allowing Mr. Sethupathi to participate in the confidence motion for the new TVK-led government on the floor of the House.
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A Bench of Justices Vikram Nath and Sandeep Mehta also stayed the proceedings before the High Court.
“This is atrocious, atrocious, to say the least. The High Court knows and says in the order that the remedy lies in an election petition, and yet entertains a writ petition under Article 226?” Justice Mehta said, addressing senior advocate Mukul Rohatgi, appearing for Mr. Sethupathi’s rival and DMK candidate from the No. 185 Tiruppattur Assembly Constituency seat, K.R. Periakaruppan.
Senior advocate A.M. Singhvi, appearing for Mr. Sethupathi, who is the petitioner, said the apex court should pass strictures against the order passed by the High Court on May 12.
“Whether he (Sethupathi) can vote or not, this order of the High Court must be stayed. There are some orders which deserve strictures to be passed by the Supreme Court; this is one of them,” Mr. Singhvi said.
Justice Nath said this issue would be considered in the final hearing.
The Bench issued notice to Mr. Periakaruppan and other respondents, including the Tamil Nadu Chief Electoral Officer.
Mr. Rohatgi sought, and was allowed, two weeks to file his counter to the petition. He said the case did not matter any longer, as the DMK had already decided to walk out of the ongoing trust vote in the 17th Legislative Assembly.
Mr. Singhvi questioned the haste shown by the High Court Bench headed by Justice L. Victoria Gowri to hear the writ petition filed by Mr. Oeriyakaruppan, a former Minister, on a Sunday, “that too for two whole hours”.
Mr. Rohatgi countered that there was nothing wrong in special hearing, considering the urgency of the issue.
“This court has held a midnight hearing for Yakub Memon… I have appeared in special sitting on weekends so many times,” he defended.
Justice Nath said the court did not care for or differentiate between one political party or another, be it “DMK, AIADMK, TVK or BJP”.
“We are only bothered about the legality of this High Court order,” Justice Nath said.
Mr. Periakaruppan lost the constituency to Mr. Sethupathi by a margin of a single vote in the April 23 elections.
While Mr. Periakaruppan, a former State Minister, secured 83,364 votes, Mr. Sethupathi got one more vote to finish the tally at 83,365.
The DMK leader had also alleged discrepancies in the EVM statistics and handling of postal ballots. He had argued that there was a mix-up in counting a postal ballot, which was cast in his favour, because it was sent to the wrong constituency.
The Madras High Court order, at the time, had left the TVK Government with a razor-thin majority in the Assembly.
This had happened shortly after Governor Rajendra Arlekar, after a delay that spanned over a week, finally invited the TVK president and the current Tamil Nadu Chief Minister C. Joseph Vijay to form the government when he could show support from 120 MLAs, just two more than the 118-majority mark.
Though the High Court had clarified that its interim order would not amount to setting aside the election win of Mr. Sethupathi, the judicial intervention, that too on the eve of the confidence motion, had reduced the number of MLAs supporting TVK to 119, precariously one more than the majority threshold in the 234-seat Assembly.
Published – May 13, 2026 01:22 pm IST
