MIC president G Palanivel and three others today failed to obtain an interim stay against a court ruling which upheld the Registrar of Societies’s (ROS) directive to the party to hold fresh elections.

Judge Datuk Asmabi Mohamad dismissed the application by the four for an interim stay after allowing ROS’s objection to the interim stay.

She made the decision in chambers.

Senior federal counsel Amarjeet Singh told the media that the court had initially fixed July 10 for the hearing of the stay application proper.

However, Amarjeet said the four had applied for an interim stay pending the hearing of the proper stay.

He said in view of the importance of the matter, the judge had brought forward the hearing date to July 6.

On June 19, Palanivel, MIC vice-presidents S Sothinathan and S Balakrishnan, and former MIC secretary-general A Prakash Rao filed the stay application, pending the disposal of their appeal against the High Court’s decision.

They had filed the appeal on June 16.

On June 15, Asmabi rejected their judicial review application and held that ROS only gave its opinion that the party had to settle its dispute, but the suggestion to hold fresh elections to resolve the party’s problems came from Palanivel.

Asmabi said Palanivel, in a letter dated Feb 5, 2015, had agreed to settle the party’s problems by holding fresh elections at all branches and divisions, including for the post of president.

On Feb 24, Palanivel, Sothinathan, Balakrishnan, and Prakash Rao filed the judicial review application to quash the ROS directive.

- Bernama