The Madras High Court is all set to deliver its verdict on Tuesday on a writ petition filed by Puducherry Congress MLA K. Lakshminarayanan in 2017 questioning Puducherry Lieutenant Governor’s (L-G) powers to interfere in day-to-day administration of the union territory despite the presence of a council of ministers.
Justice R. Mahadevan would be delivering the verdict, reserved in the principal seat of the court here last year, at the Madurai Bench of the court since he had been stationed over there for the last three months.
The case was filed when differences between Ms. Bedi and Chief Minister V. Narayanasamy were at their peak.
Senior counsel P. Chidamabaram and V.T. Gopalan had argued the case extensively on behalf of the petitioner.
They had contended that the ratio laid down in Supreme Court’s July 2018 judgment restricting the powers of the Lieutenant Governor of Delhi would squarely apply to the Union Territory of Puducherry too.
Claiming that Ms. Bedi was interfering in the day-to-day administration of the elected government and not allowing it to function effectively, Mr. Chidambaram had said: “It does not behove well of a Lieutenant Governor. It is against the Constitution. As the law is now clear in Delhi, the law must be settled in the case of Puducherry too.”
He argued that the L-G could not disagree either with the Chief Minister or other Ministers on every other issue, “create them into a dispute” and refer it to the President. Such disputes could be referred only in rarest of rare instances to resolve serious issues on which the L-G disagrees with decisions taken by the Council of Ministers.
He also argued that the LG must take her hands off after making a reference to the President and should not take a decision on issues dehors the matter pending before the latter. The law empowers the L-G to take a decision on matters pending before the President only in matters which required to be dealt with urgently and not as a matter of routine, he had said.
‘Only two issues’
On the other hand, Ms. Bedi filed a detailed counter affidavit to the case and denied all allegations levelled against her. Claiming that she had been functioning strictly in terms of the powers conferred on her under the Government of Union Territories Act of 1963, she asserted that at no stage had any challenge been thrown to the elected government.
“Pertinently, the Council of Ministers had passed 236 Cabinet resolutions in the past two years. Of these, the Administrator had difference of opinion in only two matters — one relating to loan waiver for a segment of farmers and the other on appointing MLAs as chairpersons of corporations/societies,” she pointed out.
Except these two issues, every other decision of the Council of Ministers had received the assent of the L-G. “To be precise, 99.16% of the decisions had been approved. It was just in two decisions that the Administrator had a different opinion and she referred them to the Central government as envisaged under Section 44 of the Act,” her counter read.
The court was informed that the L-G wanted to work in tandem with the elected representatives whereas it was they who stayed away, more out of political compulsions. It was alleged that the writ petitioner’s intention was to keep the L-G as a “rubber stamp authority.”