With the resignation that she has tendered to the President Pranab Mukherjee, Dikshit just handed over her immunity from criminal proceedings under Article 361(2) of the Constitution that she enjoyed while being a governor.
Barely over 12 hours after meeting home minister Rajnath Singh and dismissing the not-so-old talks in the political circuits of her possible resignation as mere speculations, Kerala Governor Sheila Dikshit put in her papers today.
However, it is being called a response to her possible transfer to another state.
Dikshit was instated as Kerala governor just five months ago in the wee hours of UPA’s demise.
There were reports that she might be shunted out of the southern state to a north-east state, just like her Maharashtra counterpart K Sankaranarayanan who quit protesting his transfer to Mizoram a day ago.
It should be noted that this tussle between UPA appointed governors and the newly elected central government has already seen five of them resigning. First it was Uttar Pradesh governor Banwari Lal Joshi, then Goa governor BV Wanchoo, Nagaland governor Ashwini Kumar, Chhatisgarh governor Shekhar Dutt, and West Bengal governor MK Narayanan. Recently, Gujarat governor Kamla Beniwal was shunted to Mizoram. In fact, Virendra Kataria, a former Congress leader, was also sacked as Puducherry lieutenant governor last month.
Now the fate of former chief minister of Delhi has taken a big turn.
With the resignation that she has tendered to the President Pranab Mukherjee, Dikshit just handed over her immunity from criminal proceedings under Article 361(2) of the Constitution that she enjoyed while being a governor.
It should be noted that AAP leader Arvind Kejriwal had ordered a probe in the Commonwealth Games scam targeting Dikshit when he was Delhi’s chief minister. Shortly before Arvind Kejriwal resigned from his CMship, he moved the high court on behalf of the government, asking to take back the appeal filed by the then Congress government headed by Dikshit. The Kejriwal government’s argument was that Dikshit would have to defend herself as she was no more the CM and the government lacked the locus standi to fight for her.
But while Kejriwal was busy in an NTDV-FB sponsored event, Congress found an escape route for loyalist Dikshit and instated her as Governor.
Article 361(2) in of the Constitution states: “no criminal proceedings whatsoever shall be instituted or continued against the President or the Governor of a State, in any court during his term of office”. Therefore, being a Governor, she had a constitutional shield against criminal cases would have been registered against her in due course, following investigations in the Commonwealth Games scam and irregularities in the Delhi Technological University admissions.
At that time, Kejriwal lost the opportunity to do a dharna.
Wonder where he is now…
