The Hindu : Gujarat Govt. to approach apex court on EC decision?

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Monday, Aug 19, 2002

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National

Gujarat Govt. to approach apex court on EC decision?

By Manas Dasgupta

GANDHINAGAR AUG. 18. The Gujarat Government has decided to approach the Supreme Court against the Election Commission's decision not to hold elections to the State Assembly at least till October, it is reliably learnt here today.

The decision was taken at a high-level meeting last night, under the chairmanship of the Chief Minister, Narendra Modi, and attended among others by the Industries Minister, Suresh Mehta, himself a legal expert, and others. It, however, decided to wait for a directive from the central BJP leadership before making the move in the apex court.

The State Government sources have confirmed that the directive was issued by Delhi today after a meeting of the Union Cabinet which on the one hand decided to refer the Gujarat issue to the President and on the other agreed with the State Government's stand to approach the Supreme Court.

The reference to the Supreme Court would include the entire EC order, including revision of the electoral rolls and the "constitutional discrepancy'' arising out of it. The sources claimed that the electoral rolls were finalised only on February 26 but the notification for the publication of draft rolls could not be issued because of the Godhra train carnage the next day and the subsequent communal riots in parts of the State. There was no question of revising the entire rolls but required only to make some alterations in the areas affected by the riots.

The Government was of the view that since the areas affected were confined to a few urban centres and a very small percentage of rural Gujarat, the revision of the rolls had been completed within a short time and elections could have been held by the end of September or first week of October.

The Commission's stand had created a constitutional discrepancy as under article 174 the next Assembly should have been convened by October 4 as the last session of the dissolved House ended on April 4.

The meeting also felt that there was no need for the imposition of President's rule in the State as legally the present caretaker Ministry could continue till January 20, six months from the dissolution of the Assembly on July 19.

Contrary to the general belief in some BJP circles, Mr. Modi personally was against the imposition of President's rule and was not convinced by the arguments by some senior leaders that a brief stint of the Central rule could spare the ruling party from the anti-incumbency factor in the coming elections.

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