Mulayam Singh wins trust vote in UP assembly

      Lucknow: Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mulayam Singh Yadav on Tuesday won a confidence motion in the Uttar Pradesh Assembly after the Lucknow bench of the Allahabad High Court admitted the petition of 40 rebel Bahujan Samajwadi Party (BSP) MLAs, who had defected to the ruling Samajwadi Party (SP) in Uttar Pradesh after forming a splinter group in 2003. The Government won the confidence vote 207-0 in the absence of any opposition.

     Following the decision, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the BSP walked out of the Uttar Pradesh Assembly. Earlier, the Assembly Speaker Kesri Nath Tripathi's decision of accepting the petition of 40 rebel BSP MLAs has been challenged by the party members. The petition was accepted in a 2-1 verdict. However, the bench said that they will be considered a part of BSP only. Former Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister and BSP leader Mayawati has called for fresh elections in UP after the court's verdict and has also demanded UP Chief Minister Mulayam Singh Yadav's resignation. On the other hand, BJP President Rajnath Singh has demanded the President's Rule in the state. However, SP leader Amar Singh has denied the existence of any kind of threats to the Mulayam Singh Government. In a house of 402 members, the strength reduced to 362, as 40 rebel MLAs will not be allowed to vote. The effective strength of the SP will also be reduced from 194 to 154. On its part, the Congress has said it will not support Yadav. But even without the support of the 16 Congress MLAs, he will have the support of 191 MLAs. This number is still nine more than the required majority of 182. In this situation, Yadav's government now depends on Ajit Singh's Rashtriya Lok Dal, which has 15 MLAs. But there have been reported differences between the two leaders. The case was earlier heard by a bench of Justices Jagdish Bhalla and M A Khan. Khan had delivered judgment while rejecting the BSP petition just a few days barely before his retirement. It was then referred to a bench comprising Chief Justice A N Ray and Jagdish Bhalla and Pradeep Kant. Senior Supreme Court lawyer Shashi Bhushan on February 17 had argued the case on behalf of the respondents. On behalf of petitioner and senior BSP leader Swami Prasad Maurya, Satish Chandra Mishra had already concluded his argument. Following the hearing, the bench had reserved the order on the petition of BSP Congress Legislative Party (CLP) leader Swami Prasad Maurya, challenging the defection of MLAs and recognition of their merger with the ruling SP. BSP petition challenges the two orders of former UP assembly speaker Keshri Nath Tripathi passed on September 6 and 8, 2003, whereby the latter had recognised the splinter BSP group and its subsequent merger with the SP. A decision disqualifying the rebel MLAs would not directly affect the Mulayam Singh Yadav government but might spell trouble for the coalition if its alliance partner, Rashtriya Lok Dal decides to part ways with its group of 15 MLAs while a favourable judgment would place the SP supremo firmly on the Chief Minister's saddle.

Congress, BJP demands resignation of Mulayam Singh

     New Delhi: The Congress party and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) today demanded resignation of Mulayam Singh Government in Uttar Pradesh immediately in the wake of the Allahabad High Court decision of setting aside the merger of 40 Bahujan Samaj Party MLAs with the Samajwadi Party. BJP spokesperson Ravi Shankar Prasad told reporters that the Court's decision has cast serious doubts on the credibility and majority of Mulayam Singh's Govt in the State Assembly and it proves that the Samajwadi Party Government in UP was conceived immorally, that has brought havoc in form of corruption and lawlessness. He also demanded immediate resignation of Mulayam Singh as the Chief Minister of UP and asked the UPA Government to bring the state under President's rule.

    Meanwhile, Minister of State for Home and senior Congress leader Sri Prakash Jaiswal also demanded Singh's immediate resignation. Mulayam Singh today moved a confidence motion in the legislative assembly and subsequently won it just after the High Courts ruling. To this the Congress spokesperson Jayanti Natarajan said: The Congress terms the trust vote as a fraud. There is no provision for a trust vote in the law unless, it has been asked for by the Governor. In this case the Governor had not asked the UP government to seek the vote of confidence. Natarajan also demanded that the Chief Minister should immediately resign on moral grounds and added that the turn of events show that the UP Chief Minister could stoop down to any level to save his Government. However, the Congress spokesperson did not make any comment on Congress' future plan telling that the future course of the Congress party will be chalked out later. Meanwhile, Amar Singh a senior Samajawadi Party leader told reporters here that the trust vote was not aimed at negating the High Court's verdict.

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