Southern States
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Tamil Nadu
Paneerselvam may not face Assembly
By V. Jayanth
CHENNAI, FEB. 2 It is now official. The Chief Minister, O. Paneerselvam, may have to step down without ever facing the Assembly or taking his rightful place there.
This is not unusual. There have been instances of Chief Ministers not facing the legislature for various reasons. But most of them have had to face at least a confidence motion or bow out for fear of losing it. But in the case of Mr. Paneerselvam, it has been a unique period in office.
For all that, he has not been Chief Minister for a very short period. In Tamil Nadu, that credit goes to the late Janaki Ramachandran, wife of the former Chief Minister M.G. Ramachandran. She held office for just three weeks. Mr. Paneerselvam was sworn on September 21, 2001 and will complete more than five months, when the Andipatti byelection results are announced on February 24.
The Speaker, K. Kalimuthu, has announced that the budget session of the legislature will begin in mid-March and that the AIADMK leader, Jayalalithaa, will be back as Chief Minister by then. This comes as no surprise because from Day One, Mr. Paneerselvam has described himself as a `stop-gap' or `interim' Chief Minister.
What is considered unusual is that the Assembly itself will not meet for the whole of this `season' when Ms. Jayalalithaa is out of office. The previous session ended on September 14 last and the very next day, the Andipatti MLA, Thanga Thamizhselvan, resigned his seat to make way for his leader. The expectation then was that the byelection could be held in January and that she could return in time as Chief Minister.
The September 21, 2001 Supreme Court verdict on the constitutionality of the former Governor, Fathima Beevi, swearing in Ms. Jayalalithaa Chief Minister led to the unseating of the AIADMK chief the same day. However, the `disqualification' issue does not stand in her way anymore and the AIADMK functionaries and the Ministers are only waiting for her to be sworn in again Chief Minister - as soon as possible after the declaration of the poll results.
As for the prolonged recess for the legislature, there are differing views. Some Ministers explain that it is not unusual and that the first sitting of the Assembly was held before in the months of February or even March. But DMK legislators insist that normally the legislature meets in January or at the latest in February.
There is first an address by the Governor, outlining Government policies. In the past, the Governor's address was delivered in January, February or even March. The House adjourned after that to meet again for the budget session. Budgets were presented a month or more, after the Governor's address and in a few years, hardly a week or two later. It is now likely that after a short break, the budget will be presented in the Assembly in March itself.
A senior AIADMK functionary said ``Our leader has always achieved what she wanted. After the physical attack on her in the Assembly in 1989, she vowed to return to the House only as Chief Minister, and she did in 1991. Similarly, when she stepped down last September, we were determined to bring her back only as Chief Minister and we will achieve that.''
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