Advani to hold talks with CMs on Art 356

In this connection, Advani said, the Cabinet secretariat had already prepared a base report on Article 356. “We will present the report to the Chief Ministers during the meeting,” he said.

According to Advani, several legal experts including former Attorney General Milon Banerjee, have expressed theview that the Bommai judgment — one of the factors that reportedly made President K.R.Narayanan send back the Union Cabinet’s recommendation — was not binding on the Government seeking dissolution of a State Government without first Parliament adopting a proclamation.

A discussion on Article 356 was in fact taken up by the I K Gujral Government through the Inter State Council but it remained inconclusive. The Home Ministry now intends to bring it to its logical end.

On the State elections front, the BJP seems to be interested in projecting a Chief Ministerial candidates in Madhya Pradesh at least, as they have already done with Delhi. The BJP’s election committee, meeting here on October 23, is likely to take up the matter.

Brushing aside apprehensions that a change of guard in the Delhi Government would send wrong signals to the voters, Advani held that such experiments had often proved successful in the past.

The Government, incidentally, has left open its option of riding roughshod over the BiharAssembly’s rejection of a separate state of Vananchal — provided it can come out with the magic numbers in Parliament. The Assembly’s locus standi in such matters, pointed out Advani, was limited in a way that its views could only be “consulted” by the President.