Patna: Leader of Opposition in Rajya
Sabha Arun Jaitley on Monday took exception to governors
withholding bills and said that it amounted to a breach of the
constitutional provisions which stipulated heads of states to
abide by the advice of the state governments.
"It has been observed that the governors in some
states have a tendency to withhold the bills sent to them for
assent that creates needless problems for the state
governments in discharge of their duties towards the people,"
he said at the orientation progamme for the state legislators.
"Those governors withholding legislations have been
simply acting beyond their jurisdiction," he said.
By sitting on the legislative proposals for long and
without citing reasons, the governors were also guilty of
jeopardizing federal structure of the Constitution, the
BJP leader said.
The time has come that either the Centre should
clarify the role of the governors or the judiciary should take
up interpretation of the legal position of the heads of the
states, he said.
The senior BJP leader said that the state assemblies
were at liberty to discuss the conduct of the governors and
censure the occupants of the post if the latter failed to
exercise `constitutional statesmanship`.
Bihar government and Governor Devanand Konwar have
been at loggerheads over the alleged interference of the
latter in the legislative process of the state.
Jaitley said that the state assemblies can also
censure the governor and cited an example in Tamil Nadu in
1970s.
PTI
