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THE NATION: CENTRE-STATE
RELATIONS
Conventions Bypassed
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OFFICERS OF CHOICE: Jayalalitha cries foul
over the requisitioning
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The requisition
issue is knottier than what the Central leadership thinks. The subtext
of the rule says that "concurrence" with the state governments
is necessary. Concurrence, in the context of constitutional provisions,
must be preceded by consultation. In this case, there is no evidence of
a prior consultation with the state Government. As Congress Rajya Sabha
member Kapil Sibal says, "The Centre could have overturned the state
Government's decision if it so wished, but it cannot disregard the due
process in recalling IPS officers." Former DGP V.R. Lakshmi Narayan
says that "the three officers will be well within their rights to
go to court against the requisition order".
According to the procedure followed in the case
of the Centre availing the services of IPS or IAS officers, state governments
are required to put up before the Union Government lists of officers whom
they can spare. The names of the three IPS officers figured on this "offer
list" of the Tamil Nadu Government. However, Jayalalitha's supporters
argue that the "consultation" process did not end with the names
of the officers concerned being put on the offer list. A nod from the
state government is still necessary.
| DEMANDING PARTNERS |
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| The Centre is under pressure
from NDA partners to help them fight their local rivals: DMK against
AIADMK, Shiv Sena against Congress, or the Trinamool against the Left.
The demands are too steep so they embarrass Vajpayee. |
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Strategists of the Union Government have pulled
out a precedent when, in the early 1990s, P. Chidambaram, the then minister
for personnel, requisitioned E.N. Rammohan, a Meghalaya-Assam cadre IPS
officer, from Assam for appointment as director-general of the Border
Security Force. "It was a reverse requisition," Chidambaram
recalls good-humouredly, "as we wanted to save the officer from political
harassment by the state government." However, in Rammohan's case,
there were hardly a ripple because the Assam government chose not to object
to the Centre's decision. Thus there was no "disagreement" as
mentioned in the proviso to the rule.
The Union Government was obviously emboldened
by a strong view in the Central bureaucracy that Delhi should have the
last word on requisitioning members of all-India services. The Centre
is also relying on a judicial pronouncement that IAS and IPS officers
found to be "excessively involved" with state governments could
be rightfully recalled without such niceties as Centre-state consultations.
The involvement of the IPS troika in question with the Jayalalitha administration
is, of course, beyond doubt. However, the Centre's power to override the
states' opposition to recalling officers still remains a grey area in
the law. Nor are the state governments likely to accept a transgression
of their rights without resistance. The fact that the states generally
do not agree to surrender their IPS officers to the Centre is evident
from a large number of IPS vacancies in the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA)
establishments. The Intelligence Bureau, for example, reported as many
as 65 such vacancies last year. An MHA source says that IPS vacancies
in the ministry are particularly pronounced at ranks below the deputy
inspector-general as state governments, requiring leadership of large
forces in the field, generally refuse to part with officers of the prestigious
service at these levels. The Tamil Nadu case obviously sets a precedent
that states may not welcome.
The spat could have been avoided if the DMK
had not turned it
into a prestige issue, virtually twisting the Centre's arms to issue the
order. The party's emissaries in the capital, notably Maran, had even
mounted pressure to dismiss the AIADMK Government under Article 356. They
cut a long face as the Centre was unable to oblige. Earlier, when the
AIADMK was in the Vajpayee-led coalition, it was Jayalalitha who had demanded
that the then Karunanidhi government be sacked. She took her revenge by
pulling down the NDA Government. If Mamata Banerjee's Trinamool Congress
pressured Vajpayee to dismiss the Left
Front government in West Bengal last year, the Shiv Sena is
now prodding him to oust the Congress-NCP Government in Maharashtra. With
the bill of coalition soaring, it is no wonder
that a much harassed prime minister last week threatened to
call it quits.
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