NEW DELHI: The governor cannot send the Bills, which were readopted by the legislature after the former withheld assent, to the President, the Supreme Court ruled on Friday. The court was responding to Tamil Nadu’s submission that Governor RN Ravi had sent to the President 10 Bills that the Assembly had readopted after he withheld his assent. The apex court asked the governor to meet with Chief Minister M K Stalin to end the impasse over the Bills.
The three-judge bench, headed by Chief Justice Dhananjaya Chandrachud and comprising justices J B Pardiwala and Manoj Misra, said, “We would like the governor to resolve the impasse.” The court was hearing a case moved by the TN government alleging that the governor was delaying clearing Bills and files sent to him.
The CJI referred to Article 200 of the Constitution and said, “The governor should have reserved it for the President first. If he has sent it back to the Assembly and then it is readopted, the governor cannot send it to the President.”
“As per Article 200 of the Constitution, there are three options to the Governor — he can assent or withhold assent or he can reserve the Bill for the President. They are all alternatives. In this case, the governor initially said I withhold assent. Once he withholds the assent, there is no question of him then reserving it for President. He can’t. He has to follow one of the three options — assent, withhold the assent or refer it to the President.
“So first and foremost, once he withholds the assent, then he can never say now I am referring it to the President. Second, once he withholds the assent, he can’t kill the Bill right there. He can’t stall the Bill there. Once he withholds the assent, the proviso does not give him the fourth option,” the CJI said. Abhishek Singhvi, appearing for TN, informing the SC the governor had sent readopted Bills to the President, accused the governor’s office of ‘constitutional obstinacy’.
‘Good if guv & CM sit together, resolve impasse’
He said Raj Bhavan had referred the Bills to the President on November 28, after having sat on them for a long time, in ‘flagrant violation’ of the constitutional scheme. The option of sending readopted bills to the President was not available to the governor once he decided to withhold assent in the first instance when they were passed by the legislature, Singhvi contended.
Attorney General R Venkataramani, appearing for the office of the governor, argued that when a governor sends back a Bill to the Assembly he is not withholding assent but merely asking the House to reconsider it. When the Assembly says it won’t change its stand on a Bill, the governor can send it to the President for consent, Venkataramani said.
The bench noted, “We are open to examining the plea that the governor has independent power of withholding assent.” “If the governor engages with the CM and meets to resolve the impasse, then it is good. This is what we suggested in the Kerala matter,” Chandrachud said, and fixed the TN government’s plea for further consideration on December 11.
Earlier, the SC had asked why the governor had delayed in granting assent to several Bills, pointing out that Bills had been pending since January 2020, and asked why do governors should wait for government to move SC with grievances.
Ravi sent 10 Bills to Prez
Appearing for TN, Abhishek Singhvi told the SC the governor had sent the Bills readopted by the House after he withheld assent to the President and described it as constitutional obstinacy