Patna: India’s top court is scheduled to hear on Monday a criminal writ petition seeking the disqualification of Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar’s House membership for allegedly concealing a pending murder case against him in his poll affidavits.

The case has been pending against him for the past 26 years but it is now that it has been brought to the knowledge of the Supreme Court in what many say is a huge setback for the chief minister.

According to media reports, a bench of chief justice of India Dipak Misra will take up the petition filed against Kumar by a Delhi lawyer ML Sharma. In his petition, Sharma alleged that the chief minister never applied for bail in this non-bailable offence and used his official position to get a closure report filed by the police.

“First, he continued [in] the post despite facing such a serious criminal charge. At least, he must have taken bail but he went on without it. And, secondly, he kept the Election Commission in the dark about his past precedent,” was how the petitioner Sharma had told the media last month after filing a case in the Supreme Court last month.

Seeking a fresh investigation into the case, the petition also urged the court to make a general declaration that anyone facing a criminal offence must be barred from holding constitutional office. Sharma filed the petition last month.

The whole revelation about Nitish Kumar having a murder case pending against him came to light after Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) president Lalu Prasad released a document to the media in July shortly after the Bihar chief minister broke away from the erstwhile ruling Grand Alliance to form government with rival Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) against which he had won elections.

Kumar, who currently heads the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government in Bihar, is at presently a Member of Bihar Legislative Council, the Upper House of the state legislature. He has not faced the voters since becoming the chief minister in 2005.

In both his poll affidavits filed in 2006 and 2012 during the time of his elections for state Legislative Council, Kumar had denied he was facing any criminal case against him.

But the opposition says Nitish Kumar intentionally concealed the case and claimed the latter had been an accused in 1991 murder case which took place during the mid-term poll for Barh Lok Sabha seat in Patna district.

“He [Nitish Kumar] is the only chief minister in the country against whom a murder case is pending,” said RJD leader Jagadanand Singh. He also mocked Kumar’s claim of morality saying, “The chief minister sought [the] resignation of his deputy after the CBI registered a corruption case against him but he himself has been continuing in the office despite being a murder case pending against him for so long.”

RJD chief Lalu Prasad too has launched a scathing attack on Kumar for continuing as the chief minister despite a murder case pending against him.

“Friends, does the chief minister accused in a serious criminal case like murder have the moral right to continue in office especially when this happens to be the CM Versus State of Bihar case?” Prasad tweeted recently.