Madras HC upholds appointment of three Puducherry MLAs nominated by Lieutenant Governor Kiran Bedi

The Madras High Court on Thursday upheld the appointment of three Puducherry BJP MLAs who were nominated by Lieutenant Governor Kiran Bedi, media reports said. The MLAs were appointed by Bedi in July last year leading to exchange of barbs between the lieutenant governor and Chief Minister V Narayanaswamy. Bedi

The chief minister had called Bedi a 'BJP agent'and used words like 'murder of democracy' while she had clarified that she was an 'agent of the Constitution'. Bedi had also said repeatedly that the MLAs were nominated to the Assembly in keeping with the norms and an unnecessary uproar was created over it.

The MLAs, all belonging to the Puducherry unit of the BJP, could not enter the Assembly all these days as the speaker had refused to swear them in, The Times of India reported.

The Congress government in Puducherry and Bedi have been at loggerheads since she assumed office in 2017 over several issues, including medical admissions, civic problems and induction of three nominated MLAs.

On 24 January, Narayanasamy had said he would soon meet the president and the prime minister to discuss the unabated violation of statutory provisions in discharging her (Bedi) duties and "interfering in the routine administration by the elected ministry". "Whenever differences arise between the lieutenant governor and the government on any matter, the concerned files should be sent to the president for final decision as had been prescribed in the statute relating to the administration of Puducherry," he had noted.

Earlier in December 2017, V Narayanasamy had alleged that Bedi's "style of functioning is more like a leader of Opposition than an administrator" of the Union Territory. Narayanasamy had said although he had written to the lieutenant governor asking her not to "overstep her constitutional and statutory limits" and not to "interfere in the routine working of the elected government", she had been doing so.

"I have written letters to her on more than 15 occasions registering protest against her style of functioning. But, she keeps functioning more like a leader of Opposition than an administrator," he had said.

With inputs from PTI