The Audit Reports: Article 151

And the same device appears throughout this book, which is worth collecting once. Chapter 660: section 14(3) of the Central Vigilance Commission Act, the annual report laid before each House. Chapter 470: section 3(4) of the Commissions of Inquiry Act, the report laid with an action taken memorandum. Chapter 1060: the Committee on Papers Laid on the Table, which polices all of them. Laying before the House is the standard accountability device of this paper, and article 151 is its constitutional form.

What is NOT in article 151

The Public Accounts Committee is not mentioned.

Chapter 1010 set out the four-step sequence: audit, laying, examination by the Committee, and the action taken reply with a further report. The first two steps are constitutional; the last two are not.

Where the last two come from. The Committee is created by rules made under article 118, chapter 1000, and the reference of the audit reports to it, the appearance of the Secretary as accounting officer, the action taken replies and the Committee's reports upon them are practice and rules, not constitutional command.

Which produces a real point for an evaluative answer. The Constitution guarantees that the report reaches the House and guarantees nothing about what the House does with it. Chapter 1130 made the same observation about committee reports generally; here it applies to the report of a constitutional officer.

And the counter-observation, which is fair. What is left to practice has in fact worked better than what is commanded. The action taken loop that chapter 1010 called the only closed loop in this paper is entirely a matter of practice, and it is the strongest accountability mechanism in the syllabus. A candidate who notices that the Constitution's silence has been filled by convention has made an observation worth marks.

Timing, and where it bites

The article fixes no time. It does not say when the reports shall be submitted, nor when they shall be laid.

Compare the statutes. Section 14(1) of the Central Vigilance Commission Act requires the annual report within six months of the close of the year under report, chapter 660. Section 8A(2) and section 8B(1) of the same Act fix ninety days and six months, chapter 640. Article 151 fixes nothing.

And that silence is one of the two structural reasons audit arrives late, chapter 1530. The other is chapter 1390's departmentalisation: an auditor who receives the accounts from the Government cannot report before the Government has produced them. Neither is a failing of the office; both are features of the framework.

The State limb

Article 151(2) is the provision that makes the one officer of chapter 1360 an instrument of every legislature in the country.

Three consequences.

The State legislature receives an audit of its Government conducted by an officer that Government cannot touch. Chapter 1280 called this the strongest independent institution in a State's field.

Every State Legislature has its own Public Accounts Committee under rules made under article 208, chapter 1510.

And the reports go to the Governor, who shall cause them to be laid. The Chief Minister does not stand between the auditor and the Assembly, exactly as the Prime Minister does not at the Union.

A worked example

An audit report on the accounts of the Union for a year is complete.

To whom is it submitted? The President: article 151(1). Not to the Ministry of Finance and not to the Government.

What must the President do? Cause it to be laid before each House of Parliament. The clause is in the imperative and provides no ground for withholding.

Is there a time limit? Article 151 fixes none, and that silence is one reason audit reaches the House late.

What happens after it is laid? By practice and rules, it goes to the Public Accounts Committee, which examines the Secretary as accounting officer, reports, receives the action taken reply and reports again. None of that is in the Constitution.

Suppose a Government simply does not lay a report. The obligation is the President's under article 151(1) and it is expressed as a duty; and the Committee on Papers Laid on the Table, chapter 1060, examines whether papers required to be laid were laid in compliance with the provision requiring them and whether there was unreasonable delay.

Now take a State report. It is submitted to the Governor, who shall cause it to be laid before the Legislature of the State: article 151(2). The State Public Accounts Committee then does what the Union's does.

And what if the audit discloses an excess over the appropriation? Then the sequence becomes constitutionally compulsory rather than conventional: chapter 1340, article 115(1)(b) requires a demand for the excess to be presented to the House of the People, and the House regularises on the Committee's examination.

What beginners get wrong

That the report goes to the Government. It is submitted to the President or the Governor.

That the President may decide whether to lay it. "Shall cause them to be laid."

That the Public Accounts Committee is a constitutional body. It is created by rules made under article 118, and its examination of audit reports is practice.

That article 151 prescribes a time limit. It prescribes none.

That laying is the end of the process. It is the beginning of the part that matters, and everything after it rests on practice, except an excess grant, which article 115 makes compulsory.

Quick revision

Art 151(1): reports on the accounts of the Union are submitted to the President, who shall cause them to be laid before each House of Parliament.

Art 151(2): reports on the accounts of a State are submitted to the Governor, who shall cause them to be laid before the Legislature of the State. "Or Rajpramukh" omitted by the Seventh Amendment, w.e.f. 1 November 1956.

What the article does: it directs the auditor's product past the executive and into the House, completing the arrangement of arts 148 and 149. The report goes to the constitutional head, not the audited Government; the duty to lay is imperative; and no ground for withholding is provided.

What it does not do: it names no Public Accounts Committee, prescribes no time limit, and says nothing about what the House must do.

The counter-observation: the action taken loop, entirely a matter of practice, is the strongest accountability mechanism in this book. The Constitution's silence has been filled by convention, and filled better than it was commanded.

The family: s.14(3) CVC Act, s.3(4) Commissions of Inquiry Act, s.22 CVC Act, and the Committee on Papers Laid on the Table which polices them all. Laying is the paper's standard device and art 151 is its constitutional form.

Test yourself

1. What does article 151 provide? That the reports of the Comptroller and Auditor-General of India relating to the accounts of the Union shall be submitted to the President, who shall cause them to be laid before each House of Parliament; and that his reports relating to the accounts of a State shall be submitted to the Governor of the State, who shall cause them to be laid before the Legislature of the State, the words "or Rajpramukh" having been omitted from clause (2) by the Seventh Amendment with effect from 1 November 1956.

2. Why is so short an article described as the hinge of the module? Because of what it directs and what it excludes. The report is submitted not to the Government whose accounts have been audited but to the President or the Governor, the constitutional head; the duty to lay it before the legislature is expressed in the imperative, with no ground for withholding provided; and the destination is the House. Articles 148 and 149 create the office, protect its holder and leave its duties to Parliament; article 151 completes the design by making the product of those duties the legislature's and not the executive's. The same device recurs throughout this book in statutory form, in section 14(3) of the Central Vigilance Commission Act, section 3(4) of the Commissions of Inquiry Act and section 22 of the Central Vigilance Commission Act, all policed by the Committee on Papers Laid on the Table; article 151 is its constitutional original.

3. What does article 151 not provide for? Three things. It does not mention the Public Accounts Committee, which is created by rules made under article 118 and whose examination of the audit reports, the appearance of the Secretary as accounting officer, the action taken replies and the further reports upon them are all matters of rule and practice. It prescribes no time limit, neither for submission nor for laying, which is one of the two structural reasons audit reaches the House late, the other being that since departmentalisation the auditor receives the accounts from the Government and cannot report before they are produced. And it says nothing about what the legislature must do with the report once it is laid.

4. Is that silence a defect? Partly, and partly not. It is a defect in that the Constitution guarantees the report will reach the House and guarantees nothing about what follows, so that the most authoritative finding of fact in Indian public administration may be laid and left. But the observation that answers it is that what has been left to practice has worked better than what was commanded. The sequence by which the Public Accounts Committee examines the accounting officer, reports, receives the Government's action taken reply and reports again upon it, returning to the matter until satisfied, is the only closed accountability loop in this entire syllabus, and not one step of it is required by any article. There is besides one point at which the sequence does become constitutionally compulsory: where the audit discloses expenditure in excess of the amount granted, article 115(1)(b) requires a demand for the excess to be presented to the House of the People, and the House regularises it upon the Committee's examination.