New Delhi: The Supreme Court (SC) Tuesday slapped a Rs 10 lakh penalty on All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) Member of Parliament C.V. Shanmugam, who had questioned using the name of Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M.K. Stalin in the state government’s welfare awareness scheme before the court. The SC also criticised Shanmugam for singling out the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) government when other states have the same policy for naming schemes.
A three-judge bench led by Chief Justice of India B.R. Gavai criticised the AIADMK MP for fighting a “political battle” in the court despite its warning to fight it out before the electorate. With this observation, the SC bench set aside the Madras High Court’s interim order, which earlier quashed the naming of the scheme as ‘Ungaludan Stalin’ (Your Stalin). The scheme intends to create awareness about government welfare programmes.
In an extraordinary order, the SC ordered the dismissal of C.V. Shanmugam’s petition in the Madras HC, saying that it was an abuse of the process of law. The Madras HC earlier held that the names of sitting chief ministers could not be used for any government schemes. With disapproval, the SC noted that the lawmaker rushed to the HC within three days of making a representation to the Election Commission of India (ECI), instead of waiting for a response and that he made sweeping, unsubstantiated allegations against the ECI, which, the SC said, were misconceived.
Represented by senior advocates Abhishek Manu Singhvi and Mukul Rohatgi, the Tamil Nadu government set up a robust defence against the MP’s petition. Arguing on behalf of the state government against the HC order, the counsels showed a list of 45 schemes named after the heads of governments.
The schemes, listed in the additional documents filed with Tamil Nadu’s appeal, include 29 welfare schemes that TN introduced over a period when it was under AIADMK rule. Some of the schemes carried the ex-chief minister and AIADMK supremo J. J. Jayalalithaa’s name, whereas some were titled “Amma”, a widely used title to describe her.
The Centre floated the eight other schemes mentioned in the documents submitted to the court by the counsels for the Stalin government. All the schemes are named after Prime Minister Narendra Modi or NaMo, a popular acronym for the PM—for instance, NaMo Lakshmi scheme, NaMo Saraswati, and Gujarat NaMo Shree Yojana, among others.
State vs AIADMK MP
Singhvi and Rohatgi took strong exception to the Madras HC passing an ad-interim or temporary order on the very first date of hearing. They cited the 2015 SC judgment allowing the use of pictures of incumbent Prime Ministers, chief ministers, Cabinet ministers, and Governors for welfare schemes. The old SC verdict, however, is silent on whether a scheme can bear the name of the head of the state since the issue before the court was then limited to only the use of their pictures.
The AIADMK MP’s lawyer and senior advocate Maninder Singh, on the other hand, reminded the SC bench that the 2015 judgment was rather against the use of government schemes for the promotion or glorification of the ruling political party, or its leaders.
The CJI, however, pointed out that the SC verdict did not prohibit the use of chief ministerial names to promote state government programmes. Maninder Singh, however, argued that “Ungaludan Stalin” was not a scheme but an awareness programme to give information to the public about other government schemes.
When Maninder Singh attempted to advance some more submissions, the CJI issued a warning, cautioning a penalty of over Rs 10 lakh. “You can continue to argue. But you should know that the cost will be commensurate with the time you take for arguments. We are warning you. You can go on,” the CJI told him, prompting Maninder Singh to stop further arguments.
In its order, the bench noted that it “failed to understand” why the AIADMK MP was “anxious” about the Tamil Nadu government scheme, when a “similar phenomenon” is seen across states.
However, according to the SC, schemes launched in the name of political leaders remained in vogue throughout the country, and TN had compiled a list of 45 schemes floated in the names of political leaders.
He added, “We do not wish to refer to those 45 schemes to avoid embarrassment at the parties. When such schemes have been floated with the leaders of all political parties, we do not appreciate the anxiety of the petitioner to choose only one party and one leader.”
(Edited by Madhurita Goswami)
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