In a first, ten bills that were sent by Tamil Nadu Governor RN Ravi to the President for assent were notified as Acts and were brought into effect without the assent of the Governor or the President on Friday, April 11.
The move came after the Supreme Court (SC) came down strongly on RN Ravi and stated that the ten Bills “were deemed to have been assented to by the Governor on the date when they were re-presented” to him by the state legislature.
P Wilson, a Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) Member of Parliament (MP) said, “Pursuant to the order of the Hon. SC the Tamil Nadu Government has notified the 10 Acts on the Government Gazette and they come into force! History is made as these are the first Acts of any legislature in India to have taken effect without the signature of the Governor / President but on the strength of the judgement of the Supreme Court!”
It may be noted that Wilson is also a senior advocate who appeared on behalf of the state in the case.
In 2022, the DMK government passed a bill transferring the power for appointing and dismissing the Vice Chancellors of the 13 state-run universities to the state government from the Governor. With the SC’s ruling, this bill has now been notified as an Act. Reacting to this, Wilson said, “Our universities will now be cleansed and taken to a new level under the chancellorship of the Governo̶r̶ment!”
Earlier, on April 8, a bench comprising SC Justices JB Pardiwala and R Mahadevan ruled that the Governor’s action of sending these 10 bills to the President was in "contravention of Article 200 and declared erroneous." It further held that any consequential steps taken by the President on these 10 bills are equally erroneous and non-est (non-existent) in law.
Governor RN Ravi had withheld assent to all the 10 bills and later reserved them for the President’s approval after the state legislature passed the bills for a second time.