Though the government sent the draft of the ordinance on October 17 to the Governor for his assent, Rangarajan chose to obtain the opinion of legal experts on the issue and decided to refer the ordinance for the consideration of President K R Narayanan.

According to sources in Raj Bhavan, the Governor yesterday referred the ordinance for Presidential opinion under Article 213 of the Constitution. The sources refused to comment on by when would the ordinance was likely to be promulgated. ``It depends on the decision of the President,'' a senior official told The Indian Express

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The Governor had received representations from different organisations including Mala Mahanadu, which is totally opposed to the ordinance, besides consulting a host oflegal experts in the last six days. The State government too was informed about the Governor's decision.

State government officials, however, expressed surprise over the development, while maintaining that the Governor was well within his rights to refer the ordinance to the President. They contended that as per the statutory provisions, there was no need for any such reference.

In fact, Chief Minister N Chandrababu, after the Cabinet meeting, made it clear after that there was no need to obtain Presidential assent to the ordinance. The State government was fully empowered to promulgate such an ordinance, he contended.

Senior officials are of the view that the Governor's decision was likely to further delay the government's move to classify the SCs into four groups based on their social and economic conditions for the purpose of job quotas from this year.

As per the practice, the President in all likelihood is expected to seek again the opinion of the National Commission for SC/STs on the issue. Asthe commission had already rejected the Andhra Pradesh government's move earlier, the whole process may come back to a square one.

Meanwhile, the chief minister convened a Cabinet meeting on October 25 to discuss the issue and take an appropriate decision to implement the categorisation at least for educational institutions from the current academic year itself, according to official sources.