India, May 7 -- Here's what should have happened in Chennai: Tamil Nadu Governor Rajendra Arlekar should have invited C Joseph Vijay of the Tamilaga Vettri Kazhagam (TVK), which emerged as the single-largest party in the Tamil Nadu assembly, to form the government in the state, giving him a week or two to prove his majority on the floor of the House. There's enough precedence and also established jurisprudence to indicate that this is how things should have gone down.

Instead, the Governor seems to have taken it upon himself - there are no rival claimants because no one else comes as close to the halfway mark in the House by numbers as the TVK does - to insist that Vijay (the popular actor is better known by his mononym) prove that he ha...