In a significant ruling, the Madras High Court has dismissed a Public Interest Litigation (PIL) challenging the Tamil Nadu government’s decision to appoint four senior IAS officers as official spokespersons. The court also imposed a monetary penalty on the petitioner, terming the plea as legally untenable.
On July 14, Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M.K. Stalin issued an order appointing Dr. J. Radhakrishnan, Gagandeep Singh Bedi, Dheeraj Kumar, and P. Amudha as official government spokespersons. The move was aimed at ensuring timely communication of key government initiatives and departmental updates to the public through the media, as well as fostering coordination among various departments.
The PIL, filed by Chennai-based advocate T. Sathyakumar, argued that the appointments were made without proper administrative procedure or official gazette notification, and therefore lacked legal validity. The petitioner alleged that the move could potentially be misused to propagate politically biased information under the guise of official communication, thereby violating constitutional principles.
The bench, comprising Chief Justice M.M. Srivastava and Justice Sundar Mohan, however, found no merit in the arguments. The court clarified that the appointment of IAS officers as spokespersons was purely administrative and not political in nature. “There exists no law or rule that prohibits the appointment of IAS officers as government spokespersons,” the bench observed.
Rejecting the claim that such appointments were unconstitutional or illegal, the court emphasized that the officers were not serving as party spokespersons but as official representatives of the government. The bench noted that the PIL lacked any substantive legal grounds and dismissed it while also imposing a fine on the petitioner for wasting the court’s time.
This is reportedly the first instance in Tamil Nadu since the adoption of the Constitution where senior IAS officers have been formally designated as spokespersons for the government.
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