6 Cong legislators resign in Manipur
THE RESIGNATIONS REDUCE THE PARTY’S STRENGTH IN THE HOUSE TO 18 SEATS FROM THE 28 IT
WON IN THE 2017 ASSEMBLY ELECTIONS
nIMPHAL:SIX Congress members of the legislative assembly (MLAS) in Manipur submitted their resignations to the speaker on Tuesday, a day after skipping the session in which chief minister N Biren Singh of the Bharatiya Janata Party (Bjp)-led government won a motion of confidence by voice vote.
The resignations reduce the Congress’s strength in the House to 18 seats from the 28 it won in the 2017 assembly elections. Manipur has been the only state in northeast where the Congress had a sizeable number of legislators, its presence having diminished in the region because of rapid strides made by the BJP in recent years .
Okram Henry Singh, one of the MLAS, confirmed the development. Other party legislators who submitted their resignations to speaker Yumnam Khemchand were Mohammed Abdul Nasir, O Lukhoi, P Brojen, Ngamthang Haqokip and Ginsuanhau, who uses only one name.
The resignations cited the legislators’ lack of trust in the Congress and were submitted while the House was in session, Henry Singh said.later on Tuesday, Speaker accepted five resignations except of P Brojen, against whom disqualification proceedings are pending under 10th schedule of the Constitution with the speaker.
In the house with an effective strength of 53, only 16 of the 24 Congress MLAS were present on Monday, enabling the Bjp-led government to sail through the trust motion 28-16, with the speaker not voting. Besides the six who resigned, the two others wrote to the assembly secretariat that they would not be attending as they had just returned from outside the state and were being tested for Covid-19. Their test results are yet to come in. These MLAS, Mohammed Fazur Rahim and Yamthong Haokip, could not be contacted because their mobile phones were switched off.
CM Singh moved the confidence motion on Friday after the opposition Congress moved a no-confidence motion against the government over alleged failure of the government to institute a CBI inquiry into a drug peddling case involving a BJP leader.
On his resignation, Henry Singh said: “Even though I’m born and brought up with the Congress, I’m compelled to resign as per the wishes of the people in my constituency.”
Henry Singh, who was elected for the first time on a Congress ticket in the 2017 assembly elections, said the six legislators who quit the assembly will also be giving up their primary membership of the Congress by submitting their resignation letters to the state party president.
Abdul Nasir said the MLAS resigned because of a lack of trust in the leadership of the Congress legislature party, which is headed by former chief minister O Ibobi Singh.“this is murder of democracy in and outside the house,” Ibobi Singh said.
The inability of the Congress to form the government despite winning 28 seats in the house of 60 in the 2017 elections and the party’s loss in the recent Rajya Sabha elections are also reasons for the resignations, Nasir said.