Tamil Nadu notifies 10 Acts sans Governor Ravi’s approval after SC's landmark verdict

Chennai: For the first time, the Tamil Nadu government has notified 10 Acts without the approval of Governor R N Ravi following the Supreme Court verdict that the bills readopted by the State Assembly, which were forwarded to the President, were deemed as having received assent.

The Acts relating to functioning of various state-funded universities and transferring the authority to appoint Vice-Chancellors from the Governor to the state government were published in the Government Gazette late Friday night after following the Supreme Court releasing the 415-page order on its website.

“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,” DMK Rajya Sabha MP P Wilson, the key face behind the government’s struggle against the Governor, said. “DMK means (creating) history,” Chief Minister M K Stalin added.

The acts that were notified are The Tamil Nadu Fisheries University (Amendment) Act, 2020 The Tamil Nadu Universities Laws (Amendment) Act, 2022, The Tamil Nadu Dr Ambedkar Law University (Amendment) Act, 2022, and The Tamil Nadu Dr M G R Medical University, Chennai (Amendment) Act, among others.

Governor Ravi had withheld the 10 bills on November 13, 2023 but the Tamil Nadu Assembly reenacted all of them on November 18, 2023 and sent them back to the Raj Bhavan.

However, the Governor chose to forward the bills to the President which has been set aside as erroneous in law by the Supreme Court and deemed to have been assented on the date when they were presented to the Governor after being reconsidered by the legislature.

With the acts being notified, the Tamil Nadu government will now have absolute control over the functioning of universities and appointment and removal of VCs even as the Governor remains as the Chancellor, stripped of almost every power that was vested with him so far.

Sources told DH that the government will fast-track the process of choosing VCs for varsities that have been functioning without heads by asking the search committees, which were not approved by the Governor so far, to start their work.

“The bills have replaced the term "Governor" or “Chancellor” with "government." The Government (effectively the Chief Minister) is the sole authority with regard to functioning of universities. The government will not just appoint VCs but also has powers to remove them from their posts,” a senior government official said.

The legislations relate to Madurai Kamaraj University, Bharathiar University (Coimbatore), Bharathidasan University (Tiruchirapalli), Annamalai University (Chidambaram), Alagappa University (Karaikudi), Manonmaniam Sundaranar University (Tirunelveli), and Periyar University (Salem), among others.