Tribune News ServiceNew Delhi, September 26
The Centre argued before the Supreme Court today that the Election Commission must adhere to the constitutional obligation of the President and the Governor to summon the legislature within six months of its last sitting while fixing a poll schedule.
Solicitor-General Harish Salve told the five-Judge Constitutional Bench headed by Chief Justice B.N. Kirpal hearing the Presidential reference on the Gujarat elections that under Article 174, the President and the Governor were duty bound to convene the House within six months of its last sitting.
Mr Salve took exception to submissions by the critics of the Union Government and certain political parties that the Supreme Court should return the Presidential reference. He said if the apex court did so it could be deemed “defective, inappropriate and presumptuous.”
He contended that returning the reference would be a retrograde step and that it was well founded. He said answering such a reference had been the rule so far.
Counsel for the Manipur government and Congress Rajya Sabha MP Ashwani Kumar argued that the Election Commission was the custodian and repository of the high constitutional power under Article 324 which was intended and designed to ensure the purity of the electoral process resulting in free and fair elections — a sine qua non of democracy in action.
“Limiting the power under Article 324 with reference to Article 174 (1) would be putting the car before the House,” Mr Ashwani Kumar said. Further, he submitted that the sole objective of Article 174 (1) was to ensure regular accountability of executive power to the people through their elected representatives, where the exercise of the high constitutional power was left to be exercised according to the judgement and discretion of the authority concerned.
