New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Wednesday, April 27, said it was wrong for the governor of Tamil Nadu to refer the remission plea of A.G. Perarivalan to the President despite the state cabinet already having made a recommendation in the case.
Perarivalan is one of the seven individuals convicted in connection with the assassination of former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi and is currently serving a life sentence.
A bench of Justices L. Nageswara Rao and B.R. Gavai was hearing Perarivalan’s remission plea. A remission plea seeks to reduce the duration of a sentence without changing the character of the punishment.
Perarivalan had sought a pardon from the erstwhile governor, K. Rosaiah,, in 2015. In 2018, the Supreme Court had told governor Banwwari Lal Purohit to take a decision, according to the Times of India.
However, as an affidavit from the Ministry of Home Affairs reveals, Purohit had referred the plea to the President, citing that he was the competent authority to take a decision on the matter.
Giving its prima facie opinion on this referral, the bench observed orally that the governor’s decision could set a bad precedent wherein every decision could be referred to the Union government, bypassing the state government entirely.
“This sets out a bad precedent. This strikes at the federal structure of the country,” LiveLaw quoted the court as saying.
This is particularly pertinent considering the Tamil Nadu cabinet had earlier given its recommendation that Perarivalan’s plea should be accepted and all those convicted in the case should be released. The court observed that the governor is bound by the advice of the cabinet and should work with it to arrive at a decision.
Arguments
Appearing for the Union government, additional solicitor general (ASG) K.M. Nataraj argued that it was within the purview of the governor’s powers to refer the plea to the President, calling the latter the “competent authority”.
However, Justice Gavai disagreed, saying that without any procedure to make such a referral enshrined within the constitution, it would “render a crushing blow to the [country’s] federal structure”.
“Otherwise we will give a go by to the entire federal structure of the Constitution for everything if the Governor refers it to the President,” Justice Gavai said.
Justice Rao, giving his prima facie view, opined that if the ASG’s contention is accepted, it would set a precedent that would give governors unchecked power to refer matters to the President whenever they disagreed with the state government.
He also said that the appropriate course of action would have been for the governor to inform the state cabinet of his inability to make a decision on the matter.
Senior advocate Rakesh Dwivedi, appearing for the Tamil Nadu government, said that if the Union government felt that the state had committed an overreach, it could have challenged the state’s decision in a constitutional court rather than the governor directly referring the matter to the President.
Power tussle
The current dispute between the governor and the Tamil Nadu government comes against the backdrop of ongoing disputes on numerous issues between the two.
The government and governor had butted heads in February this year over the former’s actions on an assembly bill seeking the exemption of the state’s aspirants seeking admission in undergraduate medical courses from the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET).
The state was of the opinion that NEET favoured students from an affluent background and went against the principles of social justice. The state had adopted the Bill in September last year and had given it to the governor to pass it along to the President for its assent. However, governor Ravi refused to do so.
Recently, chief minister M.K. Stalin took a jab at Ravi, calling him a “postman” who was tasked with passing the Bill along to the President, not with giving his approval.
Also read: V-Cs Are The Newest Chapter in Tamil Nadu’s ‘Governor Versus Government’ Conflict
Thereafter, on April 25, the Tamil Nadu assembly adopted a Bill which took away the governor’s power to appoint vice-chancellors to the state’s universities, vesting the power with the state government itself.
In this regard, Tamil Nadu joined the likes of Gujarat, Telangana, Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh.
What becomes of the accused?
The Supreme Court also noted that, while the dispute vis-a-vis the competent authority to take the call continues, the court itself could order Perarivalan’s release, given that he has already served 36 years in prison and there is sufficient precedent for the top court having granted similar relief in the past.
Perarivalan’s counsel, senior advocate Gopal Sankaranarayanan argued that the decision-making powers in remission pleas falls with the governor and his failure to do so for four years is grounds for Perarivalan’s release.
Perarivalan was sentenced to death in 1991 for being a conspirator in Gandhi’s assassination.
Note: An earlier version of this story erroneously identified R.N. Ravi as the governor whose decisions were questioned by the Supreme Court. In fact, the governor in question was Banwari Lal Purohit, who was governor of Tamil Nadu from October 2017 to September 2021. The error is regretted.