Kohima, March 10 (MTNews): The Nagaland Pradesh Congress Committee (NPCC) has sought the intervention of the Governor of Nagaland to nullify the appointment of Advisors and pro tem Speaker and uphold rule of law, citing oversight of law by NDPP-BJP.
In a press release, the NPCC Working President, Khriedi Theunuo, said that the 37 elected members were only ‘MLAs elect’ and that, “without taking the oath of office or affirmation as an MLA inside the Assembly and in front of the Speaker or Pro-tem Speaker, they are not full-fledged MLAs of the 14th Nagaland Legislative Assembly.”
“Nonetheless, the NDPP-BJP government, in clear violation of the constitutional principles of the separation of powers between the legislature, judiciary and executive which is the basic structure of the Constitution of India, has given the executive powers as Advisors to the 24 of them,” the NPCC said.
It also said that the appointment of Mhathung Yanthan as the pro tem Speaker to administer oath of office to the newly elected members of the 14th NLA is in contravention to the laid down norms as he took oath for the same on March 10 after he was allotted the executive powers as an Advisor to Agriculture department on March 9.
NPCC also said that the clause quoted by the NDPP-BJP government for appointment of the pro-tem Speaker under “Clause 9(1) of Article 180 of the Constitution of India” does not exist.
“While the people gave mandate to 37 of the NDPP-BJP aspirants in the recently concluded state general elections, it is astonishing to note that the pre-poll partners were in a rush to appoint Advisors for different government departments,” NPCC said, adding that it was “dumbfounded at the ignorance of the newly formed NDPP-BJP government.”