Justice Nagarathna recuses self from Belagavi row in SC

A Supreme Court judge, Justice B V Nagarathna on Wednesday recused from hearing a Maharashtra government's original suit filed in 2004 challenging the transfer of Belgaum, now named Belgavi, to Karnataka in 1956.

The matter was posted before a bench of Justices K M Joseph, Hrishikesh Roy and Nagarathna.

As Justice Nagarathna, who hailed from Karnataka opted out of hearing the matter, the CJI would set up a fresh bench to consider the issue.

The Karnataka government, for its part, objected to the maintainability of the suit contending, in India, there exists no legal right within a State to challenge alterations of its boundary.

"The legislative exercise of powers under Article 3 of the Constitution does not vest any right in a State government. When such an exercise is carried out, no consent or concurrence of a State is taken in terms of proviso to Article 3, only views of the State are taken," it said.

"The basis of the State Reorganization Act is not merely linguistic and the States were not divided just on the basis of language spoken by the citizens. The basis of the 1956 Act is myriad consideration of financial, economic and administrative considerations," it added.

Previously, the Union government had also questioned the maintainability of the suit.

Karnataka had also maintained that only the Union government has been entrusted with the power to reorganise, alter or diminish areas of the states. This cannot be questioned by the states, it had said.

The apex court had on December 13, 2012 framed a preliminary issue whether the suit, challenging the provisions of the States Reorganization Act, 1956 and Bombay Reorganization Act, 1960, under Articles 14 (equality) and 29 (protection of interest of minorities) of the Constitution, is not maintainable in view of Article 3 of the Constitution.