In India’s post-independent history, the spat between the Governors and Chief Ministers has been a common occurrence. The only exception was in the first decade of India’s Independence when there were just nine Governors — jurists Fazal Ali, Muhammad Saleh Akbar Hydari, KN Katju, freedom fighters Jairamdas Daulatram, Sri Prakasa, Sarojini Naidu and administrators Girija Shankar Bajpai, CM Trivedi and VP Menon.
Even though several Commissions have outlined what an ideal relationship between the two should be, the slugfest has continued unabated. Especially when the CM is not from the party that governs the Centre.
Reason for conflict
Let us examine the debate in the Constituent Assembly on the role of Governors. Some of the best minds were part of these discussions — PS Deshmukh, TT Krishnamachari, HV Kamath, HN Kunzru, Alladi Krishnaswamy Ayyar, Rohini Kumar Chaudhuri, Shibban Lal Saxena, Durgabai Deshmukh, KM Munshi and BR Ambedkar.
The general consensus was that with the clear demarcation of subjects under the Union, Concurrent and State lists, in the Constitutional scheme of things, the states were indeed sovereign in their own domain. Other than the special responsibilities given to them in the Scheduled Areas, the Governors had to abide by the advise of the elected Chief Ministers.
“I have no doubt in my mind that discretionary power is in no sense a negation of responsible government. It is not a general clause giving the governor the power to disregard the advice of his ministers in any matter in which he finds he ought to disregard,” said Ambedkar.
However, perhaps the more important reason for the absence of conflict in the first decade was not just the eminence of the people who occupied these positions, but also the complete sway that Prime Minister Nehru and the Congress party had over Indian polity. As soon as the hold of the Congress weakened, the Union government pressured Governors to indulge in back-seat driving, which inevitably led to questionable precedents.
The first such confrontation took place in 1959 when under pressure from the then Congress president, Indira Gandhi, the Nehru government at the Centre dismissed the Communist-led EMS Namboodiripad government in Kerala.
Since then, the Centre has dismissed various state governments by exercising its gubernatorial fiat. West Bengal Governor Dharma Vira dismissed the Ajoy Mukherjee government in 1967 and installed the Congress-backed PC Ghosh government. Andhra Pradesh Governor Ram Lal’s dismissal of the NT Rama Rao’s government in 1984 was a classic case of how the Governor’s impartiality had been thoroughly compromised. It touched its nadir in 1989 when P Venkatasubbaiah dismissed the SR Bommai government in Karnataka.
This led to the 1994 Bommai judgment of the Supreme Court, cautioning against the frequent use of Article 356 to take control of states not led by the party at the Centre.
The judgement extensively quoted the reports of the Administrative Reforms Commission 1968, the Rajamannar Committee 1969, the Governors Committee 1971, the Bangalore Seminar of Experts 1983 and the Sarkaria Commission 1988. The latter aptly describes the role of the governor — ‘to see that a government is formed and not to try to form a government’.
These reports highlighted how a governor who’s perceived as an agent of the Centre will deform Indian federalism and destroy our democracy. All their recommendations were geared towards making the governor the “linchpin of the constitutional apparatus of the state”.
The Bommai judgement drastically reduced the incidence of President’s rule. There were 63 such instances from 1971 to 1990. The next two decades only saw it happen 27 times.
Also Read: Governor vs govt not new in India but Constitution doesn’t guarantee a solution
Current state of affairs
After 2011, the frequency and duration of President’s rule has reduced — it was imposed in Jharkhand in 2013, Andhra Pradesh in 2014, Delhi in 2015, Uttarakhand and Jammu & Kashmir in 2016, Maharashtra in 2019, and Puducherry in 2021. But even though Governors are not dismissing CMs outright, they give wider latitude to those who are aligned with the ruling party at the Centre. For those who aren’t, Governors often withhold assent for a bill and even reserve them for the President’s consideration. While this ‘discretionary power’ was given to ensure that the state’s laws fall within the framework of the Constitution, it is often used as a political tool.
As things stand today, there is an ongoing tussle between multiple Governors and CMs in states ruled by non-BJP parties — Arif Mohammad Khan and Pinarayi Vijayan in Kerala, N Ravi and MK Stalin in Tamil Nadu, Kalraj Mishra and Ashok Gehlot in Rajasthan, Banwari Lal Purohit and Bhagwant Mann in Punjab, VK Saxena and Arvind Kejriwal in Delhi and, TK Bose and Mamata Banerjee in West Bengal. They butt heads on a range of issues, from the appointment of Vice Chancellors in state-led universities, withholding the assent to Bills passed in the state assembly, conducting of a floor test to prove majority in the house, mode of address in the assembly, to the appointment of the power regulator and the State Election Commissioner.
Maharashtra’s ex-governor Bhagat Singh Koshiyari too had locked horns with the previous Uddhav Thackeray government on several issues.
The interesting point to note is that without exception, political parties have held different views when in opposition and when they are in power. The BJP disliked the Centre’s interference with the state legislative process so much that in its submission to the 1988 Sarkaria Commission, the party suggested that states should be consulted before passing a bill on an item in the Concurrent List.
In the late 1980s, in a rare political collaboration of the Left and the Right — both the CPI(M) and the BJP suggested that governors should be appointed by a panel chosen by the state legislature and the Inter-state Council should be making the appointments. The proposition was summarily dismissed by then ruling dispensation.
As the French would say — plus, ça change, plus c’est la même chose, the more things change, the more they are the same.
Sanjeev Chopra is a former IAS officer and Festival Director of Valley of Words. Until recently, he was Director, Lal Bahadur Shastri National Academy of Administration. He tweets @ChopraSanjeev. Views are personal.
(Edited by Theres Sudeep)