KUNJUKRISHNAN NADAR Vs. SPEAKER KERALA LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE petitioner, Shri Kunjukrishnan Nadar, is a member of the Kerala State Legislative Assembly having been returned in February, 1960, from the Parassala Constituency.

(2.) ON November 23,1963 , be wrote to the Speaker, "the Hon'ble Speaker, Legislative Assembly, Kerala, Trivandrum. Sir, As I wish to devote more time for meditation and religious purposes, I shall not be able to continue as a Member of the legislative Assembly, Kerala. So, I request you to kindly accept this letter as my resignation as a member of this Assembly, to take effect from 1-12-1963. Yours faithfully, Sd. (M. Kunjukrishnan Nadar) 23-11-1963. " ON November 26, 1963 , the Speaker read the letter in the Assembly, announcing thereby the petitioner's resignation to take effect on December 1,1963. ON November 29,1963 , the petitioner wrote to the Speaker, sir, In my letter dated 23-11-1963 I have expressed my intention to resign my membership of the Legislative Assembly from the 1st of December, 1963. After mature consideration, I feel that it will be proper not to resign at this juncture. I therefore hereby withdraw my letter of resignation dated 23-11-1963. Yours faithfully, Sd. (M. Kunjukrishnan Nadar) 29-11-1963 " This letter was received by the Speaker on November 30, 1963. It appears that it was not given heed to; for the Kerala Gazette dated 10th December, 1963 , came with a Notification, "no. 6654-LA1/63. Dated, Trivandrum, 5th December 1963. Shri M. Kunjukrishnan Nadar, an elected member of the kerala Legislative Assembly from the'parassala Assembly Constituency has resigned his seat in the Kerala Legislative Assembly from the 1st December, 1963. By Order Legislature Secretariat, D. Tirumalai, Trivandrum. Secretary, Legislative Assembly". According to the petitioner his letter of November 23, 1963, "evidences only an expression of an idea that I may resign on 1st December, 1963 and is not a valid resignation in writing as provided by Art. 190 of the Constitution. That idea was changed before it was given effect to and the intimation of this change was communicated by the letter dated November 29,1963". and therefore the Notification published in the Gazette "is illegal and void and of no effect". He prays in this petition under Art. 226 of the Constitution "to declare the same (the Gazette Notification) to be null and void and of no effect and to quash the same and to declare that the petitioner still continues to be a member of the Kerala Legislative assembly".

(3.) COUNSEL for the petitioner contends that a prospective resignation is not contemplated in the aforesaid Article, that a resignation to be valid must operate in praesenti and not, in futuro, that the petitioner's letter dated November 23, 1963, being expressed to take effect only on December 1, 1963, is not a letter of resignation in accordance with the provisions of art. 190 (3) and must therefore be construed only as the expression of an intention to resign in future, and that, even if it be taken as a valid letter of resignation, it, having been withdrawn before the date it was designed to come to effect, has become inoperative and therefore the seat of the petitioner in the Assembly has not become vacant.