Should have been informed, says Kerala guv after state moves SC
THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Kerala Governor Arif Muhammed Khan on Thursday termed as improper the state government moving the Supreme Court against the Citizenship law without informing him first as he was a constitutional head of the state.
The government had moved the apex court on Monday against the new Citizenship law, saying it was contradictory to constitutional ethos.
Protocol demanded that he should have been informed first rather than coming to know about it from newspapers, Khan told reporters at the airport here.
He also wondered whether the state could move the apex court without the Governor’s approval.
Despite being the constitutional head of the state, Khan said he had come to know through newspapers the petition in the Supreme Court “I am the constitutional head of the state, and I come to know through newspapers that the government has challenged the constitutional validity. But t he protocol demanded that they should have informed me first,” Khan said.
“Even the rules of the Assembly provide that the legislature shall not discuss any subject which does not come under their constitutional jurisdiction,” he said.
“I have no problem if they go to the Supreme Court.
Even then, I feel that without informing the constitutional head of the state, what they have done is improper,” he said.
On reports that he had not signed the ordinance with respect to the amendments to Kerala Panchayat Raj Act 1994 t o increase the number of constituencies in Local Self- governments, Khan said he was not a ‘rubber stamp’, as the Constitution expects him to apply his mind and to ensure that the process of ordinance was not used for some extraneous purposes.
Khan has been at loggerheads with the LDF government since it convened a special assembly session to pass a resolution seeking to scrap the Citizenship Amendment Act.