V Senthil Balaji To Continue As Minister In Tamil Nadu Cabinet As Supreme Court Refuses To Interfere With Madras HC Order

The Supreme Court on Friday (5 January) dismissed a plea seeking removal of Tamil Nadu Minister V Senthil Balaji from the State Cabinet.

A bench of Justices A S Oka and Ujjal Bhuyan declined to intervene in the Madras High Court's judgment, which delegated the decision on V Senthil Balaji's role in the Tamil Nadu state cabinet to the Chief Minister following Balaji's arrest by the ED in a case linked to jobs-for-cash scam.

"The high court was right to consider whether the Governor has the power to dismiss a minister and left it to the Chief Minister to decide whether the person concerned should continue as a minister," the Supreme Court bench said, NDTV reported.

After perusing the High Court's judgment, the SC bench said, “We concur with the view taken… no interference is called for under Article 136".

The Court also orally remarked that a Governor does not have the authority to dismiss a minister without the Chief Minister's recommendation.

After Balaji's arrest, he continues to remain a minister although all his portfolios were revoked. This was challenged by petitioner R L Ravi, an advocate, before the Madras High Court.

In rejecting the petition, the High Court stated that ministers without portfolios neither possess specific ministries nor defined responsibilities.

"The chief minister is an executive head. It is the responsibility of an executive head to assign ministerial responsibilities to an elected representative. However, if he feels that a particular elected representative cannot be assigned the responsibility of a minister, there cannot be moral or constitutional basis to retain such a member of the Legislative Assembly as a minister without portfolio, which would be opposed to the ethos, good governance and constitutional morality or integrity," the High Court had said.

The high court, however, left the decision on Balaji to the chief minister saying “the Chief Minister of the State of Tamil Nadu may be well advised to take a decision about the continuance of V Senthil Balaji…as a Minister without Portfolio, which serves no purpose and which does not augur well with the Principles of Constitutional ethos on goodness, good governance and purity in administration”.