SC raps TN Governor for refusing to swear-in Ponmudy as Minister

Supreme Court gives Tamil Nadu Governor R.N Ravi overnight to decide on reinstating DMK leader K. Ponmudy as Minister, defying court order.

The Supreme Court on March 21, 2024, has given Tamil Nadu Governor overnight time to take a call on reinstating DMK leader K. Ponmudy as a Minister. The apex court said it would pass a judgment on Friday on his conduct in the matter.

The Bench said Tamil Nadu Governor R.N. Ravi is “defying the Supreme Court of India” by claiming that appointing DMK leader K. Ponmudy as Higher Education Minister will be against “constitutional morality” despite a Supreme Court order suspending his conviction and sentence in a disproportionate assets case.

On March 17, Mr. Ravi refused to re-induct senior DMK leader and former Higher Education Minister K. Ponmudy into the Cabinet saying it would be against constitutional morality to do so.

In a letter to Chief Minister M.K. Stalin, Mr. Ravi said it was pertinent to note that the Supreme Court had suspended the conviction by way of interim relief to Mr. Ponmudy. It only meant that the conviction, though existent, had been made non-operative and not set aside, sources in the Raj Bhavan told The Hindu on March 17.

The Supreme Court had paved way for Mr. Ponmudy, who was convicted by Madras High Court in a corruption case, to return as a legislator by suspending the sentence and staying the conviction. Following this, the DMK government sought the Governor to swear-in Mr. Ponmudy as Higher Education Minister, a portfolio he was looking after prior to the conviction.

The State government argued that the Governor had stepped out of bounds to opine that Mr. Ponmudy was “tainted by corruption” and that his appointment would be against “constitutional morality”.

Its application contended that when the Supreme Court has suspended the conviction, a legal fiction is created that the earlier finding of guilt by a lower court against Mr. Ponmudy never existed in the eyes of law.