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There are two significant aspects to the Supreme Court's latest decision on the Speaker as the adjudicating authority under the anti-defection law. The first is that Parliament should replace the Speaker with a permanent tribunal or external mechanism to render quick and impartial decisions on questions of defection. Few would disagree with the Court's view that initial fears and doubts about whether Speakers would be impartial had come true. The second is its extraordinary ruling that the reference by another Bench, in 2016, of a key question to a Constitution Bench was itself unnecessary. The question awaiting determination by a larger Bench is whether courts have the power to direct Speakers to decide petitions seeking disqualification within a fixed time frame. The question had arisen because several presiding officers have allowed defectors to bolster the strength of ruling parties and even be sworn in Ministers by merely refraining from adjudicating on complaints against them. Some States have seen en masse defections soon after elections. Secure in the belief that no court would question the delay in disposal of disqualification matters as long as the matter was pending before a Constitution Bench, Speakers have been wilfully failing to act as per law, thereby helping the ruling party, which invariably is the one that helped them get to the Chair.