A petition has been filed in the Madurai Bench of the Madras High Court seeking an interim stay on a Government Order issued by Adi Dravidar and Tribal Welfare Department in March 2019, appointing a committee to study and report on the demand to de-list six communities, including Pallars, and exclude them from the Presidential Order by grouping them as ‘Devendrakula Vellar’.
In his petition, M. Amarnath of Lalgudi said certain political parties claiming to be representatives of Pallar community made a strange request to the State government to alter the Presidential Order and to de-list Pallar, Kudumban, Devendrakulathan, Kadaiyan, Pannadi and Kalladi sub-sects from the Presidential Order and declare them Scheduled communities.
Acting on the request, the State government issued the GO, appointing the committee to study the demand. However, the move of the State was unconstitutional since Article 341 read with Article 162 of the Constitution clearly prohibited the State from exercising its executive power to alter or consider a plea for exclusion of the listed entries in the Presidential Order.
It was also a settled canon of constitutional jurisprudence that no person, who was entitled to a constitutional right or benefit, had the competence to waive or give away the benefit or status voluntarily, the petitioner said.
The GO sought to entrench into the exclusive legislative field occupied by Parliament and as such the action of the State was in violation of the federal system of constitutional governance, the petitioner argued.
The case will come up for hearing on Monday when the State will file its reply.
