SECTION - 1

OFFICE OF GOVERNOR AND ART. 356

EDITORIAL NOTE

The five year period beginning the year 1967 has been described as a period of political turmoil and uncertainty. The Fourth General Elections of 1967 brought end to one party dominance in many States and also Congress was reduced to marginal majority in the Lok Sabha. Opposition parties formed the United Fronts and came into power in several States. These parties had removed the Congress from the power. They had hardly any common philosophy to guide or common programme to implement.

With the new phenomena of defections gaining momentum, there was political instability from time to time in some of these States, the handling of which brought into focus the office of the Governor, his responsibility and powers, in the dissolution of the Legislatures and imposition of Presidential Rule. Y. B. Chavan as Union Home Minister had to handle in Parliament and explain the Central Government’s legal and moral perception of the issues involved and also to defend the office of the Governor and actions of the individuals holding that office in several States.

Imposition of the Presidential Rule in Rajasthan in March 1967, developments in Madhya Pradesh in July 1967, the Proclamation under Article 356 in relation to the State of Haryana in 1967, the dismissal of the United Front Ministry by the Governor of West Bengal in November 1967, the Constitutional Developments in Punjab in March/April, 1968, the imposition of the President’s Rule in Uttar Pradesh in 1968 provided opportunity to Shri Y. B. Chavan to analyse, explain to the Parliament, as well as to defend the Central Government of the Constitutional propriety of action by the Governors. In doing so, Shri Y. B. Chavan made perhaps the greatest contribution in making the office of the Governor, the king-pin of the delicate mechanism governing the Central-State relations.

This part contains selected speeches on that subject.