Union Cabinet to decide on OoP tomorrow

New Delhi, June 1 (UNI) The Union Cabinet will take a decision tomorrow on the office-of-profit issue in the context of President A P J Abdul Kalam returning to Parliament the bill on the subject for reconsideration on Tuesday night.

''A final decision on the Office of Profit Bill will be taken by a meeting of the Union Cabinet based on the discussion Prime Minister Manmohan Singh had with the President yesterday,'' official sources said here today.

The cabinet meeting is scheduled to be held in the evening tomorrow.

In all probability, the cabinet would decide to reintroduce the bill in Pariament with some ''cosmetic changes.'' It is likely that the cabinet woud prefer to reintroduce the bill at a special session this month, instead of waiting for the monsoon session in July.

This is mainly in the context of several disqualification petitions pending before the Election Commission and the Opposition BJP demanding immediate action by the EC.

The effort of the cabinet would be to adopt a strategy to create the impression that it did not overrule the objections raised by the President.

During his 30-minute-long meeting with the President yesterday, Dr Singh explained the situation that prompted the government to come out with the amendment bill seeking to exempt 56 offices of profit from the purview of disqualification from Parliament.

He also explained to Dr Kalam why uniformity in the criterion for deciding offices of profit could not be ensured across all States and Union Territories.

While returning the bill, President Kalam asked Parliament to look into the legal propriety of the legislation's applicability with 'retrospective' effect.

He said the Bill's focus should be on evolving a comprehensive criterion which would be fair and reasonable and applied across all States and Union Territories in a clear and tansparent manner.

Under the Constitution, the government has to bring the bill afresh in Parliament for reconsideration.

According to Article 111 of the Constitution, once cleared by Parliament again, with or without amendments, the President has to give his assent to the Bill.

Indications are that the Cabinet itself would not try to resubmit the bill for the assent of the President without the Houses of Parliament considering the Presidential message.

And since the bill was passed by the two Houses of Parliament and has been returned by the President to them, the constitutional requirement is categorical - that both the Houses reconsider the bill. It is for the cabinet to decide if this is to be done in the monsoon session of Parliament or to prepone the session for the purpose.

If the bill was passed again by both the Houses of Parliament, with or without amendments, and presented to the President for his assent, he will not withold his assent.

However, despite this provision, if the President, in his wisdom, still finds the bill to be violative of the letter and spirit of the Constitution, he has the option of seeking the advice of the Supreme Court under Article 143 of the Constitution.

UNI SH RP HS2012