GUWAHATI: Titular king Leishemba Sanajaoba of the BJP won the lone Rajya Sabha seat in Manipur while two other seats in Meghalaya and Mizoram went to ruling National People’s Party (NPP) and Mizo National Front (MNF) respectively.
Recently, the Manipur High Court had ordered Assembly Speaker Khemchand Singh to “restraint” the entry of seven Congress MLAs, facing disqualification, into the Assembly. But four of them took part in voting on Friday as their cases were disposed of on the day. The three others were not allowed to cast votes as their cases were still pending.
The court had on Thursday issued an order directing that “the order/judgment reserved today (Thursday) by the Hon’ble Speaker, shall not be pronounced by him till tomorrow (Friday)”.
The day also saw the Speaker disqualifying the lone All India Trinamool Congress (AITC) MLA T Robindro. As such, he could not take part in voting. He was disqualified on the grounds of indulging in anti-party activities and also for voluntarily giving up his party, BJP, and supporting the Congress.
Altogether 52 MLAs had cast their votes. The BJP candidate bagged 28 seats as against 24 by Congress’s Mangi Babu.
On Wednesday, three BJP MLAs had resigned from the party and the Assembly and six others – four from National People’s Party (NPP), one independent besides the AITC MLA – withdrew their support to the BJP thereby bringing the government’s strength to 23 – 18 from BJP, four from Naga People’s Front and one from Lok Janshakti Party.
All the nine MLAs, who ditched the BJP, went to the Congress camp which made the leaders of the grand old party to meet Governor Najma Heptulla on Thursday and stake claim to form “Secular Progressive Front” (SPF) government.
A delegation of SPF constituents met the Governor again on Friday to reiterate the demand for a special session of the Assembly so that the motion of no-confidence could be taken up that has been already moved.
“We have 24 Congress MLAs (including four who were allowed to vote) while BJP alone has 18. We are confident of winning the trust vote. The minority BJP government must prove its strength on the floor of the House. For upholding democracy and Constitution, trust vote is a must,” Congress spokesman Ningombam Bhupenda Meitei said.
Meanwhile, in the lone seat Rajya Sabha in Meghalaya, NPP state president Dr. WR Kharlukhi, who was the consensus candidate of ruling Meghalaya Democratic Alliance, won. He defeated the Congress’s Kennedy Khyriem, a former MLA.
In the only seat in Mizoram, K Vanlalvena of ruling Mizo National Front won. He was up against B Lalchhanzova of Zoram Peoples Movement and Dr. Lallianchhunga of Congress.