After Kerala, Tamil Nadu Moves Supreme Court to Return Presidential Reference on Assent Powers Unanswered

The Government of Tamil Nadu has filed an interlocutory application before the Supreme Court in Special Reference Case No. 1 of 2025, seeking a direction to return the Presidential Reference dated May 13, 2025, as unanswered. The state has submitted that the reference is not maintainable under Article 143 of the Constitution of India.

The Presidential Reference had been made by the Hon’ble President of India seeking the opinion of the Supreme Court on 14 questions of law relating to the powers of the Governor under Article 200 and the President under Article 201 of the Constitution concerning assent to state bills. The Supreme Court issued notice in the matter on July 22, 2025.

The Tamil Nadu Government has stated that the issues raised in the reference have already been directly or indirectly adjudicated by the Supreme Court in The State of Tamil Nadu vs. The Governor of Tamil Nadu 2025 SCC OnLine SC 770, decided on April 8, 2025. The application claims that the reference is an attempt to reopen settled questions and amounts to an appeal in disguise.

According to Tamil Nadu, Article 143 cannot be invoked to overrule a final judgment of the Supreme Court. It has submitted that the Court in Ahmedabad St. Xavier’s College Society v. State of Gujarat (1974) and Cauvery Water Disputes Tribunal, Re (1993 Supp (1) SCC 96) held that an advisory jurisdiction under Article 143 cannot be used to review or sit in appeal over a prior decision of the Court.

The application includes a detailed chart correlating the 14 questions in the reference with findings already made in the April 2025 judgment. Tamil Nadu submits that Questions 1 to 11 and 13 are fully or partially covered by the earlier judgment. It also states that Questions 12 and 14 are either already answered or irrelevant to the current legal framework.

Question 14, according to Tamil Nadu, assumes that the Governor is an organ of the Union of India. The state has contested this position as incorrect, stating that the Governor functions independently and not as an agent of the Union. It argues that the framing of the question is based on a legally flawed premise.

The application also points out that there has been no review or curative petition filed against the April 2025 judgment. Therefore, the state argues, there is no valid basis for a fresh reference to the Court. It cites Special Reference No. 1 of 2002 and Shrimanth Balasaheb Patil v. Karnataka Legislative Assembly (2020) 2 SCC 595 to support its position that only substantial and unresolved constitutional questions can be referred under Article 143 read with Article 145(3).

Tamil Nadu further relies on previous cases such as State of Punjab v. Principal Secretary to Governor (2024) and State of Telangana v. Secretary to Governor WP(C) No. 1224 of 2023 to demonstrate that the legal questions raised in the reference are no longer pending or novel.

In its prayer, the state has requested the Supreme Court to declare the Presidential Reference as non-maintainable and to return it unanswered. The application has been settled by Senior Advocate P. Wilson and filed by Advocate T. Harish Kumar on behalf of the State of Tamil Nadu.

This move by Tamil Nadu comes after the State of Kerala also opposed the maintainability of the same Presidential Reference earlier this month.

Case Title: In Re: Assent, Withholding or Reservation of Bills by the Governor and the President of India

Case Number: Special Reference Case No. 1 of 2025