Guv issues ordinance for contingency
Sandesh Prabhudesai
30 March 2002
At last, amidst controversy, Governor
Mohammed Fazal issued an ordinance, increasing limit
of the contingency fund by over hundred folds.
To run the state of affairs of Goa
administration in the new financial year till 15 June
without the annual budget being presented, the ordinance
makes provision of Rs 690 crore in the contingency fund,
increasing its normal limit of mere Rs 10 crore.
The piquant situation has arisen as
the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party suddenly went for
the dissolution of the state Assembly on 27 February,
on the eve of the budget session, under provisions of
Article 174 (2) b, while allowing the 14-member cabinet
to continue in power.
Legal experts, at this stage, felt
that the governor will have no other option than imposing
the President's rule under Article 356. This is the
only provision that can make funds available for the
state administration for its routine expenditure in
the new financial year, by presenting and passing the
budget by the Parliament.
"These are all half-baked and ignorant
constitutional experts. They do not know what constitution
provides for", stated chief minister Manohar Parrikar,
while going ahead with a cabinet decision, recommending
to the governor to issue the ordinance to increase the
limit of the contingency fund.
While issuing this ordinance now, the
governor has inserted new section 2A in the Goa Contingency
Fund Act 1988. It states that all the government revenue,
state-raised loans by the issue of treasury bills, loans
or ways and means advances and all moneys received by
the government will be paid into the contingency fund,
till 15 June and up to the limit of Rs 690 crore.
"This is totally unconstitutional,
since the governor has amended the constitution through
an ordinance", states Adv Cleofato Almeida Coutinho.
According to him, neither public revenue can go into
any other account than the consolidated fund nor the
governor is authorised to amend the constitutional provisions.
Based on similar arguments, Dr Kashinath
Jalmi, former minister and general secretary of the
Maharashtrawadi Gomantak Party, is now filing a petition
in the high court here, challenging the ordinance.
Parrikar however fully justifies the
act, claiming that due care is being taken by consulting
even legal experts at the central level, before carrying
out the exercise. Though he also claims that there are
precedents in the past to tackle the issue in such a
manner, legal experts claim that it is the first time
such kind of wrong step is being taken.
