Supreme Court To Hear President vs Kerala, Tamil Nadu Over Assent For Bills
The issue of gubernatorial and presidential assent to state bills came up in the Supreme Court Tuesday morning after the Kerala and Tamil Nadu governments opposed a presidential reference to the court's April verdict, which said governors could not reserve bills for the president if they had withheld consent in the first instance, and that the president must sign off on all bills within three months.
The court overruled the states' objections but promised a full hearing. A five-judge Constitution bench led by Chief Justice BR Gavai then directed the states and the centre to file replies within a week.
The next hearing will likely be in August.
Kerala's ruling Left Democratic Front and Tamil Nadu's Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam both opposed any hearing on President Droupadi Murmu 's letter to the Supreme Court in May.
Their challenges were also shot down - although in comments that have raised eyebrows - by Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, who was appearing for the centre. Mr Mehta declared, "... repeated requests (referring to the states' challenges) are only successful if a man is proposing to a girl."
There were 14 questions in Ms Murmu's letter, which was sent under Article 143 of the Constitution that allows the President to ask for the opinion and advice of the Supreme Court.
These included a pointed query about the judiciary's authority to prescribe deadlines for governors and the president to sign off on bills passed by state governments, and another about the judiciary possible interfering in a governor's exercise of constitutional discretion.
Ms Murmu's letter drew a strong response from Tamil Nadu Chief Minister MK Stalin, who said he "strongly condemns... attempts to subvert the Constitutional position settled (by the Supreme Court)".
The DMK boss - who faces a critical election next year, for which the BJP has allied with arch-rivals the AIADMK - also called it a "desperate attempt to weaken democratically elected state governments".
Earlier, in what was a brief hearing, senior advocates KK Venugopal and P Wilson, appearing for Kerala and Tamil Nadu respectively, questioned the viability of the presidential reference.
"It will directly affect us..." Mr Wilson said, possibly in reference to 10 bills the Tamil Nadu government signed into law in April. This was after the Supreme Court ruled Governor RN Ravi had overstepped his authority by denying assent despite each having been passed twice.
A bench of Justice SB Pardiwala and Justice R Mahadevan said, "... these bills shall be deemed to be cleared from the date it was re-presented". That order has also been questioned by the President, who asked if "... it is a law in force without the assent of the governor..."
To Mr Wilson's comment, the Chief Justice replied, "It will affect the whole country."
In April the Supreme Court had set deadlines for the governor and president to sign off bills passed by a state government. This was in response to controversial face-offs between the governors of Kerala, Tamil Nadu, and Punjab and the non-BJP governments in each state.
Justice Pardiwala and Justice Mahadevan used a special power given to the Supreme Court to settle the issue, and did so by calling Governor Ravi's withholding assent "arbitrary" and "illegal" and setting all governors and the president a tight deadline to review and sign off on state bills.
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