This has led to aspirants reaching out to senior party leaders in BJP and RSS to put across their candidature.
New Delhi: Gubernatorial positions in several states are falling vacant in the coming days and this has led to aspirants for these posts reaching out to senior party leaders in BJP and the RSS to put across their candidature. The states which will see a new Governor include Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Sikkim and Meghalaya. Apart from these four states, Nagaland, Puducherry and West Bengal, too, do not have a full-time Governor as of now.
The tenure of B.D. Mishra, the Governor of Arunachal Pradesh, ends in October. Similarly, the term of former Delhi BJP stalwart, Jagdish Mukhi, who is the Governor of Assam with additional charge of Nagaland, too, ends in October. The outspoken Satya Pal Malik, who is the Governor of Meghalaya and someone who has been speaking out against the policies of the present government, ends in September 2022. Malik, who was among the most favourite of the present political dispensation for a long time, served in important states like Bihar, Odisha (additional charge), Jammu and Kashmir (during which Article 370 was abrogated), Goa and finally Meghalaya.
Ganga Prasad, who is the Governor of Sikkim, had first taken oath as Governor of Meghalaya in October 2017. He also held the additional charge of Governor of Manipur.
After the selection of the Rajasthan-based Jagdeep Dhankhar by BJP as the Vice President candidate, the office Governor of West Bengal, too, is now lying vacant with L.A. Ganesan, Governor of Manipur, holding the additional charge.
Similarly, Telangana Governor, Tamilsasi Soundararajan, is holding the additional charge of the Lieutenant Governor of Puducherry since February 2021 when the incumbent Kiran Bedi was removed before the completion of her tenure. If the Government of India decides to end the tenure of a few more governors who have served in various states in the same positions for more than five years now, then in total, nine positions of Governors will open up across the country in the coming weeks and months.
Banwarlial Purohit, the present Governor of Punjab and Administrator of Chandigarh, had first taken oath as Governor of Assam in August 2016. Since then, over a period of almost six years, he has served as the Governor of Meghalaya and Tamil Nadu. Same is the case with Acharya Devvrat, who first took the oath of Governor in August 2015 when he was appointed as the Governor of Himachal Pradesh. Then in July 2019, he was shifted to Gujarat in the same position.
Under Article 155 of the Constitution, the Governor is appointed by the President of India and under Article 156 (1), the Governor holds office during the pleasure of the President which is normally for five years. When the Narendra Modi-led BJP government had come to power in May 2014, a majority of the Governors, including former Delhi Chief Minister, Sheila Dikshit, had resigned from the post much before the tenure was supposed to end. Dikshit resigned as Governor of Kerala, just five months into her tenure. She thereby became the eight Governor to resign after K. Sankaranarayanan (Maharashtra), M.K. Narayanan (West Bengal), Ashwani Kumar (Nagaland), B.L. Joshi (UP), B.V. Wanchoo (Goa) and Shekhar Dutt (Chhattisgarh) and V. Purushothaman, the governor of Mizoram. All of them were appointed by the UPA government just months before the 2014 general elections. Last week, the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) had arrested four people who were falsely impersonating themselves as senior CBI officers and falsely assuring interested individuals of appointing them as Governors across different states in lieu of money.