Court case(1977) 3 SCC 592

After the Janata Party's victory in the March 1977 Lok Sabha election, the Union Home Minister wrote to the Chief Ministers of nine Congress-ruled States suggesting that, as their party had been rejected by the electorate, they should advise their Governors to dissolve the Assemblies and seek a fresh mandate. Six States sued the Union under Article 131, and Congress legislators filed writ petitions, contending that the threatened use of Article 356 to dissolve duly elected Assemblies on the ground of a Lok Sabha result was unconstitutional and mala fide.

The seven-judge Bench dismissed the suits and petitions. The satisfaction required by Article 356(1) is largely political and is for the President on the advice of his Ministers; the courts cannot sit in appeal over it or examine the adequacy of the material. But the power is not wholly immune: Bhagwati J held that where the satisfaction is mala fide or based on wholly extraneous or irrelevant grounds the Court can interfere, since no constitutional power is absolute. The Home Minister's letter did not by itself amount to an unconstitutional exercise of the power. Beg CJ described the Constitution as "amphibian", able to move on the federal or the unitary plane as the situation requires, and held that the Union's power of supervision over State governments shows the Indian federation is not of the classical kind.