Collective and Individual Responsibility

That third limb of article 78 is the collective responsibility rule expressed as a duty: a minister's individual decision can be pulled back into the Council.

A worked example

A minister's department is found to have spent public money on a scheme the Cabinet never approved, and the minister tells the House that the Cabinet did approve it.

The misleading statement. This is the clearest modern ground for resignation everywhere, because the House cannot hold the executive to account if it is not told the truth.

The unapproved decision. Under article 78(c) the President may require the Prime Minister to submit the matter to the Council. Collective responsibility then either adopts the decision or repudiates it.

Confidentiality. Article 74(2) prevents a court being asked what advice was given. It does not prevent Parliament asking, and it does not prevent the Comptroller and Auditor-General reporting on the expenditure.

The vote. If the House is dissatisfied with the government's answer, the remedy is a motion of no confidence against the government, not against the minister, which is what collective responsibility means.

The cases

Facts. S.R. Bommai v. Union of India, (1994) 3 SCC 1, required the Supreme Court to consider both the responsibility of a State ministry to its Assembly and the extent to which the material before the President under article 356 could be examined, notwithstanding article 74(2).

Held, by nine judges. The proclamation is justiciable and the material on which the satisfaction is based can be called for and examined; article 74(2) bars inquiry into the advice tendered, not into the material on which the advice was founded. Majority support is to be tested on the floor of the House.

Why it matters here. It draws the boundary of Cabinet confidentiality: the advice is protected, the material is not, and the distinction is what makes collective responsibility compatible with judicial review.

Facts. Rai Sahib Ram Jawaya Kapur v. State of Punjab, AIR 1955 SC 549, concerned executive action taken without legislation, and required the Court to describe how responsibility operates.

Held, by Mukherjea CJ. The real executive power is in the Council of Ministers, which is responsible to the legislature; the head of State is a formal or constitutional head.

Why it matters here. It is the authority that responsibility runs to the legislature and not to the head of State, which is the difference between a parliamentary and a presidential executive.

Distinctions

What beginners get wrong

"Article 75(3) makes individual ministers responsible." It makes the Council collectively responsible. Individual responsibility is convention.

"Collective responsibility means ministers must agree." It means they must not disagree in public. Disagreement in Cabinet is the point of Cabinet.

"A minister must resign whenever the department fails." The classical rule; the modern practice is narrower, and an answer should say so and give the reason, which is that departments are too large for a minister to know what every official does.

Limits and criticism

Collective responsibility protects as much as it constrains. A government with a majority cannot be dismissed by the legislature, so the sanction is theoretical for most of a term.

Confidentiality can conceal. Article 74(2) has been read narrowly in S.R. Bommai for that reason.

Individual responsibility has weakened everywhere. The modern substitutes are parliamentary committees, audit bodies, ombudsmen and freedom of information legislation, none of which is in the Constitution.

Quick revision

1. Collective responsibility has three limbs: confidence, unanimity in public, and confidentiality.
2. India: articles 75(3) and 164(2); confidentiality supported by article 74(2).
3. Ireland: Article 28.4.1, the Government responsible to Dail Eireann.
4. The unanimity limb is conventional and has been suspended, in the United Kingdom in 1975 and 2016.
5. Individual responsibility requires answering, correcting and, in the classical account, resigning; modern practice confines resignation largely to personal fault and misleading the House.
6. Article 77 allocates business; article 78 gives the Prime Minister duties including submitting an individual minister's decision to the Council.
7. S.R. Bommai: article 74(2) protects the advice, not the material.

Test yourself

1. State the three limbs of collective responsibility with the Indian provisions. Confidence: article 75(3) at the Union and article 164(2) in a State make the Council of Ministers collectively responsible to the popular chamber. Unanimity in public: convention, with no textual basis. Confidentiality: supported by article 74(2), which bars any court from inquiring what advice was tendered.

2. Is individual ministerial responsibility part of Indian constitutional law? Not as a rule of law. The Constitution states only collective responsibility. What it provides is the machinery: article 77 permits rules allocating business among ministers, which identifies who answers, and article 78 obliges the Prime Minister to communicate decisions and, if the President requires, to submit an individual minister's decision to the Council.

3. What exactly does article 74(2) protect, and what does it not? It bars any court from inquiring whether, and if so what, advice was tendered by ministers to the President. S.R. Bommai v. Union of India, (1994) 3 SCC 1, holds that it does not bar the court from calling for and examining the material on which the satisfaction was based, so the reasons are protected and the record is not.

4. Why has individual responsibility weakened, and what has replaced it? Because departments are now too large for a minister to be personally aware of the acts of officials, so a rule requiring resignation for any departmental failure would be either ignored or destructive. The replacements are institutional: departmentally related standing committees, the Comptroller and Auditor-General, ombudsmen, and freedom of information legislation, none of which appears in the Constitution.