With a spree of dismissals and inductions in the last ten days, The ADMK regime overhauled the team of law officers representing it in the Madras High Court and the Madurai bench. The latest churning process started with the unexplained removal of State government pleader S. Venkatesh and special government pleader (education) Sampath last week. Within a couple of days, one special government pleader each in the Madurai bench (Jameenraja) and the principal bench in Chennai (MCSamy) were sacked.
On February 6, the government appointed senior advocate A L Somayaji as Additional Advocate General (I). Almost simultaneously, it roped in former Advocate General N R Chandran to defend, along with Advocate General A Navaneethakrishnan, the government’s “policy decision” to convert the Rs.550-crore New Assembly-cum-Secretariat complex into a multi-super specialty hospital before the National Green Tribunal (NGT). Only on Feb 6, the Tribunal stayed the government decision and directed it not to alter the structure or commence any medical activity from there. Somayaji assumed charge as Additional Advocate General on Feb 8.The state currently has five other additional AGs, including one in the Supreme Court.
The state government’s legal team in the High Court has two wings –the prosecution team headed by the state public prosecutor and a civil team headed by the government pleader. The overall head of the team is the Advocate General. After the ADMK returned to power, I Subramaniam was appointed as public prosecutor on June 2, 2011. He lasted a year, and was succeeded by another senior advocate, S Shanmugavelayutham, in June 2012.
Compared to the frequent reshuffling of the ADMK Cabinet and Bureaucrats by Jayalalitha, the shakeup of government law officers seems to have set in rather late. Now that about two years have been completed, perhaps Jayalalitha might have felt that it is time for a performance-cum-result audit and would have realized that to defend the government’s policies, mere loyalty is not enough.
The very first decisions of the Jayalalitha’s “Yes, yes Amma” Cabinet ended in fiasco in the highest court of the land in spite of roping in the services of seasoned senior counsels of the Supreme Court without trusting the talent of their selected Advocate General, to defend its policies and actions right from the High Court. What was the expenditure involved in vainly going on appeals after appeals, paying very high fees for the appearance of senior counsels and spending on their flight from Delhi to Chennai and back and for their stay and expenses for legal teams of the state government to fly to Delhi and return, just as couriers and carriers- all to end in total failure?
The ADMK government lost the Samacheer Kalvi case and all its political detentions under the Goondas Act were quashed, in such a case against late Veerapandi Arumugam, the government went up to the Supreme Court engaging private senior counsels. Its much touted special courts for land grab cases too are in disarray. Its moves like conversion of Anna Centenary Library in Kotturpuram, Chennai into children’s hospital, takeover of land allotted to Muthamizh Mandram in Chennai, surrendering back to the vested private interests the prime land worth Rs.200 crore near Anna Flyover in Chennai etc had been stayed. Now the ADMK regime is resorting to its accustomed tactics of intimidating and harassing opposition party functionaries and the media with a spate of defamation cases. None of the hundreds of such defamation cases against political adversaries and the media filed by Jayalalitha’s previous regimes in 1991-1996 and 2001-2006 witnessed their legal end.
The government managed to end the case of removal of over ten thousand Makkal Nala Paniyalargal by arriving at a compromise with a functionary of their association, much against the protests of the workers. So too in the Viswaroopam film ban case a compromise was arrived at saving the government of further embarrassment. However it was like the battle won but war lost, as Jayalalitha incurred wrath of people all over the world.
While the Supreme Court held that the policy decision of the government is judiciable if it had foregone accrual of ‘potential’ revenue in the on-going 2G spectrum case, its verdict that it was for the executive to decide where the Assembly should be held and the policy decision to convert the new secretariat into a hospital could not be questioned, is strange given that the government would have to incur further expenditure to the tune of several crores of rupees in redesigning the entire structure, constructed at a cost of Rs.550 crore, except the circumference walls. Now Jayalalitha had sanctioned Rs.50 crore for repairs to be carried out to Namakkal Kavignar Malaigai in the old secretariat. So, if a policy decision which seemed to have foregone ‘potential revenue gain’ is judiciable, will not a policy decision resulting in ‘actual loss of revenue by way of unnecessary expenditure’ be also judiciable? Moreover, whether it was a policy decision itself is questionable because the shifting of the Assembly back from the New Assembly-Secretariat complex to St.George Fort was started in the evening of May 13, 2011, when the results of the Assembly elections were pouring in and completed the next day (May 14). Jayalalitha and her ministers were sworn-in only on May 16 and the first Cabinet meeting held on the same day did not take this decision on shifting. In democratic set up only a popularly elected government can take policy decision on such matters of vital interest.
A honest review of the spate of unnecessary and very costly litigations the ADMK regime needlessly invited by its thoughtless and politically motivated decisions and vindictive cases filed against its political opponents and their end results in all courts –from the district magistrate and civil courts to the levels of High and Supreme courts, will provide the pointer to where the flaws originate. When the cases filed by the government are sinister in nature and the litigations that arise out of its sinister moves, no amount of talents and expertise of lawyers representing it can win them. If Jayalalitha had made a performance-cum-result audit of her ministers, bureaucrats and law officers and effected reshuffles, who is to do the same for her, because this is essentially an one-person regime? r
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