Mamata-Guv honeymoon over after row over panchayat polls, univ VCs

The signals were there for quite some time about the honeymoon period being over.  But throughout the past week the tiff between Raj Bhavan and the state secretariat in West Bengal reached a new high.

Among the two issues in the fresh tussle between the two, the first is the continuing clashes and violence over the rural civic body polls, where the Governor decided to be "mobile" and "on-ground" by  making district tours interacting with the victims and their families, with the state government and the ruling Trinamool Congress leadership opposing it with scathing criticism.

The second issue is regarding the decisions made and directions given by Governor CV Ananda Bose on the governance of the different state- run universities, which the state government and the ruling dispensation have described as an action beyond the constitutional authority of the Governor.

Be it the Governor’s decision to open a "Peace Room" within the Raj Bhavan premises where the victims of clashes and violence can directly call up or register their complaint or Bose rushing to the sites of violence and interacting with the victims there directly, they have not gone down well with the ruling dispensation.

The Trinamool Congress’s state spokesman Kunal Ghosh and maverick party legislator Madan Mitra had been especially vocal against the Governor on these issues.

While Mitra had advised the Governor to book his return ticket from Kolkata after the panchayat polls were over with the Trinamool Congress registering a thumping victory, Ghosh went a step further by accusing the Governor of misusing Raj Bhavan funds in publishing a book penned by him. Ghosh has also described the Governor as the "chairman of the opposition parties in West Bengal".

On the issue of the governance of state universities, the decisions of the Governor for appointing interim vice chancellors for 11 state universities, announcing parallel awards for extraordinary educationists, students and researchers and introducing the provision for "student vice chancellors" have made things uglier as regards the deteriorating relations between the Raj Bhavan and the state secretariat.

Although a division bench of the Calcutta High Court Chief Justice T.S. Sivagnanam had upheld the decision of the Governor to appoint interim vice chancellors, the development had not brought an end to the continuing salvos from the ruling dispensation on this issue. 

State education minister Bratya Basu has been the main critic of the Governor on this issue. According to Basu the Governor since the beginning had been operating as per his own whims, not having any discussion either with the state government or the education department before taking such decisions.

According to Calcutta High Court counsel Kaushik Gupta, the opening of the "Peace Room" in  the Governor's House had been absolutely right from the legal and administrative perspective.

"As I learnt from different media reports the complaints received at the "Peace Room" were being forwarded by the Raj Bhavan straight to the office of the West Bengal State Election Commission for the latter to take action. Through this the Governor has established his point that while as the constitutional head of the state he is worried about the poll- related violence, instead of taking any suo motu action he is forwarding the same to the competent authority which is responsible for ensuring free and fair polls. Such a constitutionally smart move has left the state government or the ruling party without any administrative or legal counter except resorting to political salvos," Gupta said.

Similarly, he added, in the case of appointments of interim vice-chancellors in state universities, the state government’s counter-administrative action to order stop-payments of salaries, allowances and other financial entitlements to these vice chancellors has been censured by the court. "The division bench of Justice Sivagnanam has not only upheld the Governor’s decision on such appointments but also clearly said that it is the responsibility of the state government to bear the expenses for payments of salaries, allowances and other financial entitlements to these vice chancellors," he added.

Columnist RN Sinha said that the Governor by virtue of his chair is also the chancellor of all state universities and he made this appointment of the interim vice-chancellors by virtue of this post. "The Raj Bhavan- state secretariat tiff is nothing new in West Bengal. During the previous Left Front regime, while the then Governor Gopal Krishna Gandhi was having a tiff with the Left Front regime over the police firing and violence at Nandigram, then Trinamool Congress was relishing that. In the present context with the Trinamool Congress in power, the opposition parties are the entertained observers," he added.