Guv-CM tiff escalates in Punjab, AAP wants Purohit shifted out

Punjab Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann on Tuesday questioned the “criteria” adopted by the Centre for appointing governors and the state's ruling Aam Aadmi Party demanded that Governor Banwarilal Purohit should be immediately shifted out, as the row between the two escalated.

Mann hit back at Purohit a day after the governor questioned him on the process of selecting 36 government school principals for a training seminar held recently in Singapore, saying he has received complaints of “malpractices.”

The chief minister accused the Governor of interfering in the state government's affairs and, replying to Purohit's letter made public Monday, indirectly questioned his credentials for the post.

“You asked me about the basis of the selection of principals for sending them to Singapore for training. The people of Punjab want to know on what basis the central government appoints governors to various states in the absence of any clear qualifications (for the post) in India's Constitution,” he wrote.

“Please increase the knowledge of Punjabis with a reply,” he added in the letter written in Punjabi.

Mann said the issues raised by the Governor were matters related to the state government.

“I want to make it clear in this regard that according to the Indian Constitution, I and my government are answerable to three crore Punjabis.”

Earlier in the day, Mann said at a training session for new MLAs that only those elected by the people of Punjab should take decisions on running the state.

“Only the elected should do this, not the selected ones who unnecessarily interfere,” he said in an apparent dig at Purohit, without naming him.

“In a democracy, the elected are higher. The selected could be anyone,” he said.

Simultaneously, his party launched a scathing attack on the Governor, referring also to his earlier remarks on drug abuse in Punjab.

This indicated that “he is acting at the behest of the Centre to defame the ruling AAP government,” party spokesperson Malvinder Singh Kang said.

“The AAP spokesperson said the governor is not maintaining the sanctity of his post and demanded that he should be shifted from the state immediately,” a statement said.

Kang asked Purohit not to cross “limits”, saying that under the Constitution the Governor must act on the advice of the Council of Ministers. The Constitution does not provide for a “parallel administration,” he said.

Apart from questioning the CM on the principals' trip, the Governor had also accused him of not caring to reply to the earlier letters from Raj Bhavan.

The Governor's letter had listed the "illegal" appointment of Punjab Agricultural University vice-chancellor and the promotion of an IPS officer who was shunted out for alleged misconduct among the issues on which he had sought explanations in the past.

He also wanted details on the appointed of Gurinderjit Singh Jawanda as the chairman of Punjab Information and Communication and Technology Corporation Ltd, referring to allegations that he was named in a kidnapping and property grab case.

Purohit told the chief minister that people did not elect him to run the state according to his "whims and fancies" and under the Constitution, he is "bound" to furnish any information sought by Raj Bhavan.

The Governor had said he would seek legal advice for further action if Mann didn't reply within a fortnight.