Chennai: Making a climb down following the Supreme Court's strong criticism, Tamil Nadu Governor RN Ravi has extended an invite to Chief Minister MK Stalin for talks 'to resolve pending issues' on the Raj Bhavan granting assent to Bills passed by the state assembly. The Bills have been pending for months, forcing the state government to move the apex court.
The government said the Chief Minister had accepted the invite, indicating a thaw in the relationship. However, an early meeting of the Governor and the Chief Minister is not on the cards since the administration is busy with the relief and restoration works in the state capital and three adjoining districts, battered by cyclone Michaung. According to Government sources, the date for the meeting of the two constitutional functionaries is being worked out.
From asserting that if a Bill adopted by the assembly is withheld, the legislation is dead and 'withheld' is a decent language of conveying it, now the Governor had been forced to give up his confrontationist attitude and engage the elected government. Interestingly, the invite from Raj Bhavan comes a day after the Tamil Nadu government moved the Supreme Court, seeking to declare as unconstitutional, arbitrary and illegal the Governor reserving 10 Bills, re-adopted by the assembly, for the President's consideration. In an application, the state had sought permission to add this prayer to the pending suit against the Governor.
The 10 Bills, re-passed by the assembly after being returned by the Raj Bhavan, remove the Governor from the office of Chancellor of state-run universities, vested with the power to appoint Vice-Chancellors. With this, the ongoing turf war between the DMK government and the Raj Bhavan reached a crescendo, with the latter maintaining that these Bills were contrary to UGC regulations. Further, he also issued unilateral notifications on constituting selection committees for identifying VCs for two universities, though the statutes of the respective varsities do not grant him such powers.
On December 1, the Bench led by Chief Justice DY Chandrachud questioned the Governor's inaction in granting assent to the Bills and told Attorney General R Venkataramani that the Governor could resolve the impasse by engaging with the Chief Minister. On the options before the Governor on Bills, the CJI said Bills returned and re-passed by the assembly cannot be referred to the President.
In its plea on Tuesday, the state government argued that the Governor referring the Bills to the President should be quashed as ultra vires the fundamental rights of the people of Tamil Nadu. This is an additional prayer to the main suit, accusing the Governor of displaying 'constitutional obstinacy', in which the court sent notice to the Governor on November 10. Subsequently, he returned the 10 Bills mentioning 'assent withheld'. Then when they were re-passed in a special session on November 18, he forwarded them for presidential reference on November 28, which has irked the court.
The court made it clear that once the Governor withholds assent, he could not resort to another option of presidential reference which is not available under the Constitution. Further, the CJI-led Bench also drew attention to the fact that the court had laid down the law in the case of the Punjab government and Governor. Now, it is expected that the impasse will soon be resolved.
