Ranchi, March 10
Three Jharkhand legislators, including a minister, whose support Chief Minister Shibu Soren has been claiming, did not turn up on Thursday to take oath in the State Assembly.
The absence of Kamlesh Kumar Singh, Minister and Nationalist Congress Party legislator, Aparna Sen Gupta of the Forward Bloc and Bhanu Pratap Dehati, backed by the same party, created panic in the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) ahead of Friday’s trust vote.
Dehati and Singh are learnt to be in Chhattisgarh, a BJP-ruled state. Their abstention from voting to indirectly help the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) defeat Soren is not being ruled out.
The NDA has already claimed the support of 41 legislators in the 81-member assembly.
NDA legislators, including five independents, arrived here from Jaipur by a chartered plane around 12 noon and headed for a luxury hotel. Commandos of the Jharkhand Armed Force accompanied them.
They later trooped into the Assembly to take oath as a crowd waited outside in anticipation. Heavily armed commandos managed the security.
Enos Ekka, an independent legislator, pledged his support to the NDA. “I am with the NDA and will remain with the NDA,” he told reporters.
After taking oath, Ekka passed by Soren, chief of the Jharkhand Mukti Morcha, and the UPA legislators to meet pro-tem speaker Pradeep Balmuchu.
“The Shibu Soren government would be defeated,” BJP state president Raghubar Das said.
