The Governor has a crucial role to play in the formation of the next government in the State as none of the political parties has got a clear majority.
His main responsibility in a fractured mandate, is to verify the claims of the political parties in forming the next government to ensure that a “stable government” is formed in the interests of the State, say legal experts.
To ensure this, legal experts say the Governor can exercise discretionary power to invite either the BJP, which is the single largest party or the post-poll-result coalition between the Congress and the JD(S).
There are precedents in several States where the Governors had either invited the single largest party despite not having a clear majority or the pre-poll or the post-poll coalition between two or more political parties.
The ultimate aim of the Governor is to ensure that a stable government is formed and for this purpose the Governor has to exercise discretionary powers based on precedents and conventions, said former Advocate General B.V. Acharya.
Pre-poll alliance between the political parties are safer for Governors to trust to ensure formation of a stable government than the post-poll-result alliances, which, sometimes, will be only to grab the power, say experts. However, the claims over number of MLAs made by both the claimants also plays a crucial role in deciding whom to invite to form a stable government, they said,
To ensure that the claims from both the BJP and the Congress-Janata Dal (Secular) coalition have some reasonable grounds, the Governor can adopt a proper method to satisfy himself on this aspect before deciding whom to invite to form the government, say legal experts.
Former Supreme Court judge N. Santosh Hegde said there were several judgments and precedents guiding the exercise of descretion by the Governor. “S.R. Bommai judgment clearly says that the strength of the parties must be decided on the floor of the House and not at the Governor’s house. In this context, the ideal way ahead is for the Governor to immediately convene the Assembly session, appoint a protem speaker, administer oath for all the elected members, before asking both the contenders to prove their majority on the floor of the House. Whoever wins the confidence vote should be sworn in as Chief Minister,” he said.
