The Supreme Court Friday asked if it is open to a Governor to reserve Bills sent by the state Assembly, for the consideration of the President after they have withheld assent to a Bill.
A bench of Justices J B Pardiwala and R Mahadevan posed the query to Attorney General R Venkataramani while hearing petitions filed by the Tamil Nadu Government challenging Governor R N Ravi’s decision to refer some Bill regarding the management of the universities in the state for consideration to the President.
“Article 200 envisages three situations. Either the Governor assents to the Bill or withholds assent or reserves the bill for consideration of the President,” Justice Pardiwala pointed out and asked, “Can he (Governor), after withholding assent, say I am reserving it for President’s consideration? Or without saying I am withholding assent, he has to straightaway refer it to the President?”
Article 200 of the Constitution gives the Governor the power to approve or withhold approval to Bills passed by the state legislature.
“Having taken a conscious decision to withhold assent, later can he say now I’m adopting the third option available to me to refer it to the President? Because at each stage in Article 200, the prefix is or — either he assents to the Bill or he withholds assent … or he reserves it for President’s consideration,” Justice Pardiwala added.
Explaining the query further, Justice Pardiwala said, “Why we put this question (is) if he assents, matter over; (if he) reserves also the matter over. If he withholds, the first proviso immediately gets into operation and later, to overcome that, can he say he is referring to the President?’
To that Attorney General Venkataramani responded that it would depend on the fact situation. The bench then said it was not referring to the fact situation, but whether it is permissible in law. The top law officer answered in the affirmative, and said Article 200 will receive a very flexible construction.
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Venkataramani contended that under the provision, the Governor has both power and a city. He added that in referring the Bills to the President, the Governor was only performing his constitutional duty as some of these sought to dislodge him as the vice-chancellor of the state’s universities and replace him with the state government.
The hearing will continue on February 10.
While hearing the matter Thursday, the Supreme Court questioned Governor R N Ravi’s decision to withhold assent to the Bills and said “he seems to have adopted his own procedure”. “It doesn’t make any sense… (Governor) saying that ‘I withhold assent but will not ask you to reconsider the Bills’ and thereby frustrate the second part of Article 200,” said the bench.
© The Indian Express Pvt Ltd
