Thiruvananthapuram, Oct 8 (PTI) Kerala Governor Arif Mohammed Khan on Tuesday accused Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan of “silence, inaction and inordinate delay” on his request for information regarding alleged anti-national and anti-state activities going on in the state.
The scathing accusation comes in the wake of Vijayan’s letter, earlier in the day, to Khan stating that officials cannot be summoned by the Governor without informing the elected government.
The CM’s letter was referring to Khan seeking a briefing from Chief Secretary Sarada Muraleedharan and DGP Shaik Darvesh Saheb regarding recent reported remarks by Vijayan that groups are smuggling gold into the state and using the proceeds for ‘anti-national activities’.
Khan had also sought a briefing from them regarding the phone-tapping allegations involving police officials.
However, following the CM’s letter, both the chief secretary and the DGP did not meet the Governor.
Following this, Khan shot off a letter to Vijayan stating that his “silence, inaction and inordinate delay” on the Governor’s requests for information on such serious matters “are intriguing and create an impression that you (CM) have something to hide”.
Khan further said, “… a government shying away from its constitutional duty of providing information to the Governor on grave matters like anti-national activities and treating the request of the Governor as a routine administrative matter, stands the risk of being viewed as acting against constitutional provisions and constitutional morality.” The CM in his letter had said that Khan’s move seeking a briefing from the two officials was “against principles of democratic governance, scheme of constitutional provisions and constitutional morality” and a “communication conveyed behind the back of an elected government”.
Terming the contentions in the CM’s letter as “unfair and unfortunate”, Khan said the intention behind seeking a briefing was to fulfil his constitutional duty as Governor “to furnish a report to the President of India about the anti-national and anti-state activities going on in the past three years as publicly revealed by you (CM) and deliberately not shared with me”.
“Moreover, the grave crime of using ill-gotten money from gold smuggling for anti-national activities cannot be brushed aside as a routine administrative matter citing constitutional morality,” the Governor said in his letter.
Khan said that the matters on which he had sought a briefing were those which Vijayan had been “sharing with the media in recent weeks while deliberately keeping me in the dark about them”.
“I appreciate that you acknowledged in the letter that as per Article 167 of the Constitution of India, the Chief Minister is duty bound to provide information required by the Governor.
“However, it is surprising to note that you chose to avoid my request to have a briefing from the Chief Secretary, that too, in the absence of a response from you to my letters,” Khan said. PTI HMP HMP KH
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