V Narayanasamy urges Centre to accept Puducherry’s demand for statehood

Puducherry: Chief Minister V Narayanasamy on Saturday urged the Centre to accept Puducherry’s demand for full statehood to ensure its overall development.

In Delhi for the Niti-Aayog conference, the CM also met Prime Minister Narendra Modi and presented a memorandum of many demands of the Union Territory.

In the memorandum, a copy of which was released to the media by the chief minister’s office here, Naryanasamy said the demand for statehood had been constantly pursued with the Centre since 1987. The Puducherry government had passed resolutions on the floor of the Assembly seeking statehood on several occasions. The resolutions were forwarded to the Union Home Ministry seeking immediate steps to grant statehood to Puducherry, now a Union Territory.

At loggerheads with Lt Governor Kiran Bedi, the CM contended that in a democracy, real power must subsist in the hands of the ministers who are elected representatives and accountable to people through their collective responsibility to the legislature.

 “The relationship between the Council of Ministers and the titular head of the State is governed by the over-arching consideration that real power and substantive accountability is vested in the elected representatives of the people,” the memorandum said.

Had Puducherry been a state, it would have received 42 per cent Central grant which would be on par with other states as recommended by the Central Finance Commission instead of the present 30 per cent grant, it pointed out.