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House allotted to Haryana Speaker inside police complex raises questions of propriety
Speaker Harvinder Kalyan, however, has turned down the allotment saying it would set an inappropriate precedent
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The Haryana government’s controversial decision to earmark a government house for state assembly Speaker, Harvinder Kalyan, inside the Madhuban Police Complex, a large multi-institutional police establishment in Karnal, has raised questions over the appropriateness of locating the Speaker’s residence within a functioning police establishment.
Kalyan, however, has declined to occupy the government house, stating that this could disturb the functioning of the police complex, cause inconvenience and that the allotment of the said house for residential purposes may not set an appropriate precedent for the future. The Speaker has sent a written communication in this regard to the chief minister Nayab Singh Saini.
The episode raises questions over the basis on which the accommodation meant for the Speaker was identified by the government inside a police establishment and the appropriateness of housing the presiding officer of the legislature within a police complex. Kalyan is a BJP legislator from Gharaunda assembly constituency in Karnal.
Institutional distinction between legislature and executive
The episode also brings into focus the broader institutional distinction between the state legislature and the executive mandated by the framers of the Constitution. The constituent assembly, while debating the constitutional provisions pertaining to the legislature’s secretariat (Article 187 of the Constitution), had on July 30, 1949, stressed the need to keep the legislature’s institutional machinery free from the control of the executive.
Chairman of the committee responsible for drafting the Constitution of India, Dr BR Ambedkar, while explaining the provision had said that executive control over the legislative personnel is derogatory to the dignity of the Speaker and independence of the legislative assembly.
Legal experts pointed out that the issue was not merely of staffing but of institutional relationship between the legislature and the executive. “The framers wanted to ensure that the machinery required for the functioning of the legislature was not under the administrative control of the government. Allotment of a house to the Speaker in Madhuban Police Complex is against the spirit of the Constitution. Moreover, the Speaker already has a rent free accommodation in Chandigarh which is allotted to him under a statute. The second house allotted would have been outside the purview of the statute,’’ said former additional solicitor general (ASG) of India, Mohan Jain. The former ASG also termed it as “misuse of power”.
The Supreme Court, in one of its landmark judgments, had quoted MN Kaul and SL Shakdher’s Practice and Procedure of Parliament 4th edition to underscore the pivotal position of the Speaker in parliamentary democracy, stating that all important conventional and ceremonial heads of Lok Sabha are the Speaker. “Within the walls of the House his authority is supreme. This authority is based on the Speaker’s absolute and unvarying impartiality - the main feature of the office, the law of its life,” it said.
‘I’d requested the govt to provide a house till my own is renovated’
The Speaker, when asked about the house allotment, said that he had requested the state government for providing an accommodation at Karnal since his old house (having his camp office also) built in 1950s was in a bad shape and needed renovation. “So it would have been a temporary arrangement only till the renovation was completed. But I turned down the offer to occupy the government house in Madhuban Police Complex as I felt that would cause disturbance to the complex and it would be inappropriate,’’ the Speaker said.
How the allotment in police complex got done?
The orders to earmark “Government House Number 2, Madhuban Police Complex, Karnal, for use as Camp Office by Harvinder Kalyan, Speaker, Haryana vidhan sabha as a temporary measure for a period of one year” was issued by the IG, Haryana Armed Police, Madhuban, Ashok Kumar on August 26. This directive follows an office memo by the Haryana DGP and in compliance of August 12 orders of the Chief Minister’s office.
Kumar when asked as to under which rule the allotment was made said he merely followed the orders of the state government and the DGP. While DGP Ajay Singhal did not respond, a senior police official said that the orders came from the CM and the government would surely have done due diligence.
The Madhuban Police Complex houses Haryana police academy, armed police battalions, forensic science lab, state crime record bureau, finger prints bureau and other police institutions and facilities. “Such an allotment to a politician would have effectively turned the Police Complex into a place of unregulated entry. “There would have been serious security and discipline concerns. BJP workers would have thronged the complex and created chaos,’’ said a police official.
