Stalin, Mann govts move SC against governors' delay in approving bills

The governments of Tamil Nadu and Punjab have moved the Supreme Court alleging delay by the state governors in giving assent to bills passed by the respective state assemblies.

Tamil Nadu Governor R N Ravi and his Punjab counterpart Banwarilal Purohit have a running feud with the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam and Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) governments led by M K Stalin and Bhagwant Mann.

The Tamil Nadu government urged the top court to intervene, alleging that ”a constitutional authority” was consistently acting in an ”unconstitutional manner impeding and obstructing" the functioning of the state government for ”extraneous reasons”.

”Extraordinary circumstances call for extraordinary measures,” it said in the plea filed through advocate Sabarish Subramanian.

”Declare that the inaction, omission, delay and failure to comply with the constitutional mandate by the governor of Tamil Nadu/ first respondent qua the consideration and assent of the bills passed and forwarded by the Tamil Nadu state legislature to him and the non-consideration of files, government orders and policies forwarded by the state government for his signature is unconstitutional, illegal, arbitrary, unreasonable besides mala fide exercise of power,” the Tamil Nadu government said.

The two petitions were filed on October 28.

The details of the petition filed by the Punjab government were not immediately available.

Punjab Governor Banwarilal Purohit has granted assent to 22 of the 27 bills passed by the state assembly.

Recently, three money bills, which were proposed to be presented by the AAP government in a special session of the state assembly, were sent to the governor for prior approval but gubernatorial consent was withheld.

This led to adjournment of the special assembly session and Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann made a statement that the state government will move the top court.

The Tamil Nadu government, in the plea, said 12 bills passed by the state assembly were pending with the office of Governor R N Ravi.

The governor, by "not signing remission orders, day to day files, appointment orders, approving recruitment orders, granting approval to prosecute ministers, MLAs involved in corruption including transfer of investigation to CBI by Supreme Court, Bills passed by Tamil Nadu legislative assembly is bringing the entire administration to a grinding halt and creating adversarial attitude by not cooperating with the state administration", it said.