Impeachment of the President of India

The Union Executive has been discussed in Part V of the Indian Constitution from Articles 52 to 78. However, here will be discussing the Head of the Indian State or the President. The President of India is the formal head of the three branches of governance, namely, the executive, legislature and judiciary. The President of India also serves as the Commander-in-Chief of the three-armed forces. 

Article 52 provides for a President of India and Article 53 vests the executive power of the Union in the President of India. Though this article states that the power vested can be exercised by the President of India directly or through the officer’s subordinate to the President, in practice, the power of the executive is exercised by the Council of Ministers headed by the Prime Minister. Article 61 deals with the impeachment procedure of the President of India. But before directly reaching the impeachment process, we need to know the qualifications, oaths, conditions, and term of office of the President.

Impeachment

Impeachment is defined as the act of questioning something’s integrity or legitimacy. The term impeachment refers to the procedure for removing a person in a position from all of the powers and obligations that the post requires. Impeachment is the term used to describe the complete process of removing someone from office. It generally refers to the President, judicial judges, and other constitutional officers. Impeachment refers to a claim of misbehavior leveled against a public official in a country with a federal presidential Constitutional republic government.

Conditions of President’s Office (Article 59)

There are certain conditions laid down in the Constitution of India for the office of the President.

• The President should not be a member of either the house- Lok Sabha or Rajya Sabha of the Parliament of India or a member of the House of the state legislatures. If any such person enters the office of the President, he is believed to have vacated the seat of membership of that House on his entering date of the office of President.
• Any office of profit under the Union or state government shall not be held by the President.
• The President is entitled to use his official residence (Rashtrapati Bhavan) without payment of rent.
• The President is also entitled to allowances, emoluments and other privileges as determined by the Parliament of India. 
• The allowances and the emoluments received by the President cannot be diminished he is in office.

Term of the office of President (Article 56)

From the date President enters upon his office, he holds the office for a term of 5 years. However, the President can at his will resign from his office by tendering his resignation letter to the Vice-President at any time.

Further, by the impeachment process, the President can be removed from his office even he has not completed the term of five years.

Until the person succeeding to the office of President assumes his charge, the sitting President can hold office extending past 5 years.

The sitting President can also be re-elected to his office for any number of terms. However, as it happens, a person can be elected for the office of the President in the USA only for a maximum of two terms.

Impeachment of President (Article 61)

• The sitting President can be removed from his office before completion of his term of 5 years by the procedure of impeachment of the President of India for ‘violation of the Constitution. 
• Even though impeachment meaning as the removal from his office is known, the term ‘violation of Constitution’ has not been defined by the Constitution. 
• Either House of the Parliament of India can initiate the charges of impeachment against the President. 
• One-fourth of the members of the House that has framed the charges of impeachment should sign the charges and the Presidents should be handed over a notice of 14 days.
• The impeachment resolution is sent to the other House to investigate the allegations once it is passed by the two-thirds majority of the House which initiated the charges of impeachment.
• The right to appear before the investigating House and the right to be represented is possessed by the President.
• However, if the motion is passed in the other House too by a two-thirds majority, the President is deemed to have been removed from his office from that day.
• The important point to note here is that the nominated members can also participate in the impeachment process.
• However, the elected members of the state legislatures and the UTs of Delhi and Puducherry shall not participate in the impeachment process.

A note of President Impeachment

Until now, no president has faced impeachment proceedings in India. The method, however, has been established by the law of the nation. The President may be impeached by the Indian Parliament before the end of his term for breaking the Indian Constitution. The procedure might start in either of Parliament’s two chambers. A House of Representatives begins by laying accusations against the President. The allegations are contained in a notice that must be signed by a fourth of the House’s total members. The notification is then forwarded to the President, who will examine it after 14 days.

A two-thirds mandate (special proportion) of the total population of the originating House is required to pass an impeachment resolution against the President, which is then transmitted to the other House. The allegations made are investigated by the other House. A two-thirds mandate (special proportion) of the total population of the originating House is required to pass an impeachment resolution against the President, which is then transmitted to the other House. The allegations made are investigated by the other House.

Conclusion

The President of India is the head of the state of India and the executive decisions are taken in the name of the President. Questions have been asked from this section of the Indian polity hence it is important for the aspirants of the various government exams to understand this topic.