Centre's Arunachal move far from clear

It is not clear what judicial or constitutional sense the Supreme Court eventually makes of the decision of Arunachal Pradesh governor J.P. Rajkhowa to summon a session of the state legislature in contemptuous disregard of the elected state government, which has been used as fodder for the imposition of President’s Rule, but the constitutional goings-on in respect of this sensitive border state in the Northeast in the past month and a half appear to be downright shabby.

The state government could not stick to its own schedule of January 14 for the commencement of a session of the Assembly because it was restrained from doing so by the Gauhati High Court, which was hearing the matter of the so-called impeachment of the Speaker in a “session” of the “Assembly” held in a private hall which had been sanctioned by the governor. Chief minister Nabam Tuki has gone on record about this, and prima facie he appears to have a case.

As such, can the state government be held guilty of breaching the Constitution which holds that a session of the legislature must be held before six months have elapsed since the previous session? This is among the reasons cited by the Union Cabinet in recommending President’s Rule. As a Constitution Bench of the apex court sits to decide whether the residuary powers of the governor allow him to call a state Assembly to session without reference to the elected government, the top court must also look within itself. If it had freed the state government from the restraint imposed by the high court to not call a session of the legislature as the circumstances relating to it were sub judice, then the matter would have been in the political realm, not the constitutional arena.

Had the state government then been in breach of the six-month rule, the decision to impose direct governance of the state from the Centre — because presumably the constitutional machinery has broken down — would have had a ring of authenticity about it, although the political circumstances of Arunachal Pradesh have been indeed murky for some time. It is hard to say without close examination whether hard horse-trading led to a rift in the ruling Congress Legislature Party, or whether the ruling party in the state mismanaged things completely and allowed its disgruntled members to join hands with the Opposition BJP in a bid to overthrow the Tuki government.

Anyhow, by going in for President’s Rule, the Centre has not covered itself with glory. Its case seems far from clear. Whether the government will be able to find ratification for its decision in the RS is far from certain since it is well short of numbers there. A bad show on the whole.