SC slams TN guv Ravi for 'own procedure' to delay bills

The Supreme Court on Thursday set about defining the constitutional contours of a governor's authority regarding assent to bills, framing eight key questions while expressing strong disapproval of Tamil Nadu governor RN Ravi's prolonged delay in acting upon bills passed by the state legislature.

- Utkarsh Anand

NEW DELHI:

A bench of justices JB Pardiwala and R Mahadevan observed that the Tamil Nadu governor seems to have devised his "own procedure" in withholding assent to bills referred by the state government, and sought the reasons behind Ravi keeping the bills pending for three years and then referring it to the President.

"It also does not make sense to keep withholding assent and not send to the legislature, thereby frustrating the last proviso of Article 200 (which deals with the Governor's assent to state bills). He seems to have adopted his own procedure. He rendered the second part of the proviso redundant by his actions," the bench told attorney general R Venkataramani, who appeared for Ravi's office.

The second part of the proviso to Article 200 states that if the governor returns a bill to the state legislature for reconsideration and the legislature passes it again, with or without amendments, the governor must give assent to the bill. By sitting on a bill indefinitely, this provision can be rendered ineffective, crippling the state legislature's lawmaking power.

The court is currently hearing two petitions filed by the Tamil Nadu government challenging the governor's decision to withhold assent and, in some instances, refer bills to the President years after their enactment.

The bench sought to ascertain the extent of a governor's discretion under Article 200 of the Constitution, which empowers the governor to approve or withhold assent to bills passed by the state legislature. The bench emphasized the need to clarify whether a governor can withhold assent indefinitely, a practice informally termed "pocket veto", and whether a governor is bound to grant assent once a bill is reconsidered and re-enacted by the legislature.