The Supreme Court, in an effort to clearly mark the boundary of action by governors in the event that a bill passed by the state assembly is set for their ascent, ruled that being titular heads of states, they don’t have the power to veto legislative actions of elected governments or sit indefinitely on bills passed by the legislature.
A bench of CJI D Y Chandrachud and Justices B Pardiwala and Manoj Misra stated that unbridled powers to “unelected head of state” to sit indefinitely over bills “virtually veto the functioning of the legislative domain by a duly elected legislature by simply declaring that assent is withheld without any further recourse”.
The judgement passed on a plea by the Mann government in Punjab against Governor Banwarilal Purohit on November 10, was uploaded on the SC website on Thursday.
“Such a course of action would be contrary to fundamental principles of a constitutional democracy based on a parliamentary pattern of governance,” CJI Chandrachud said.
The bench also observed that the speaker enjoys absolute power for adjourning and proroguing the House.
“It is the right of each House of the legislature to be the sole judge of the lawfulness of its own proceedings so as to be immune from challenge before a court of law. During the tenure of the assembly, the House is governed by the decisions which are taken by the speaker in matters of adjournment and prorogation,” the order noted.
“The governor cannot be at liberty to keep the bill pending indefinitely without any action whatsoever. The governor, as an unelected head of the state, is entrusted with certain constitutional powers. However, this power cannot be used to thwart the normal course of lawmaking by the state legislatures,” the CJI further said.
“Consequently, if the governor decides to withhold assent under the substantive part of Article 200, the logical course of action is to pursue the course indicated in the first proviso of remitting the bill to the state legislature for reconsideration,” the court order added.
The court also addressed the issue of the Constitution’s silence over the period within which a governor is to take a decision on whether to give assent, the bench suggested that it could not be interminably long.
“The substantive part of Article 200 empowers the governor to withhold assent to a bill. In such an event, the governor must mandatorily follow the course of action which is indicated in the first proviso of communicating to the state legislature ‘as soon as possible’ a message warranting reconsideration of the bill,” the bench stated.
“The expression ‘as soon as possible’ is significant. It conveys a constitutional imperative of expedition. Failure to take a call and keeping a bill duly passed for indeterminate periods is a course of action inconsistent with that expression. Constitutional language is not surplusage,” the bench further said.
ALSO READ: SC Talks Tough on Punjab, TN Governors ‘Sitting Over’ Bills, Says Don’t ‘Play With Fire’
Comments
0 comment