Single Advocate General under the Constitution, while States may appoint Additional Advocate Generals as executive assistants.

Article 165 contemplates a single Advocate General for each State, because the constitutional office is framed in singular terms and is meant to be held by one qualified person. General interpretive rules under Article 367 and the General Clauses Act do not override that context. However, the State may still use its executive power under Article 162 to engage legal practitioners as Additional Advocate Generals, provided they are not treated as holders of the constitutional office or as persons empowered to discharge its constitutional or statutory functions. The State therefore cannot multiply the office of Advocate General, but it may make non-constitutional legal appointments for assistance.

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Issues: Whether a State can appoint more than one Advocate General under Article 165 of the Constitution of India, and whether appointments styled as Additional Advocate Generals can be sustained as an exercise of the State's executive power under Article 162 of the Constitution of India.

Analysis: Article 165 contemplates appointment of one person qualified to be appointed as a Judge of a High Court as the Advocate General for the State. The constitutional scheme treats such a constitutional office as one to be held and discharged by a single holder, especially where the office carries both constitutional and statutory functions. The use of singular language in Article 165 is not displaced by Article 367 and Section 13 of the General Clauses Act, 1897, because the context of Article 165 requires otherwise. At the same time, the State remains free, in the exercise of its executive power under Article 162, to engage and designate legal practitioners to assist it, so long as such appointees are not treated as holders of the constitutional office of Advocate General or as persons authorised to discharge its constitutional or statutory functions.

Conclusion: The State cannot appoint more than one Advocate General under Article 165, but it may designate lawyers as Additional Advocate Generals under Article 162 as executive appointees without constitutional status. The challenge to the Government orders therefore fails.

Ratio Decidendi: Where the Constitution creates a singular constitutional office to be filled by one qualified person, the office cannot be multiplied by applying general rules of interpretation; however, the State's executive power may be used to make non-constitutional legal appointments that do not confer the office or its functions.

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