Rajasthan Governor Kalraj Mishra has once again snubbed Ashok Gehlot government’s proposal for convening the Assembly session.
The Rajasthan Raj Bhawan on Monday returned the files related to the convening of the Assembly session to the Parliamentary Affairs Department of the state.
Returning the files, the Governor has also sought some additional details from the Congress government led by Ashok Gehlot. Thus, no decision has been taken yet on convening the Assembly Session on Friday as requested by Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot.
Seeking clarification from the state government over the proposal on the convening Assembly session, Mishra has asked, “Do you want to move Motion of Confidence? It is not mentioned in the proposal but you have been speaking about it in media.”
According to sources quoted by ANI, the Governor further said that “it will be difficult to call all the MLAs for the Assembly session in the wake of COVID-19 pandemic.”
“Can you consider giving a 21-day notice over the convening of Assembly session?” he asked.
The Chief Minister, who first wrote to Governor Kalraj Mishra requesting an assembly session from today and protested for five hours at his residence, the Raj Nivas, to push for it last Friday, submitted a fresh proposal on Sunday and listed Coronavirus and economy as the agenda for the special session.
Earlier on Friday, refusing to accede to Ashok Gehlot’s call for an Assembly session to prove majority, the Governor had sought a reply on six points from the state government, including about the reason to call a session of the Assembly for a floor test.
Following this, the Rajasthan chief minister, in a late-night meeting on Friday, discussed the six points raised by the Governor for calling an assembly session. The meeting was held at the chief minister’s residence which lasted for nearly two and a half hours.
The Ashok Gehlot-led Congress government, which is facing a political crisis after rebellion by 19 dissident Congress MLAs, including rebel party leader Sachin Pilot, wants to hold the assembly session to prove its majority.
On Saturday, Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot, during the Congress Legislative Party (CLP) meeting at Fairmont Hotel in Jaipur, said his party will go to the Rashtrapati Bhavan to meet the President, if needed and even go to the extent of staging a protest outside the Prime Minister’s residence.
Gehlot also said that the Congress will not let the BJP “succeed in their conspiracy”.
Earlier in the day, he had called a meeting of his council of ministers at his residence to rework on a proposal to the Governor over calling a session of the state assembly.
With the Rajasthan High Court ordering a status quo in the disqualification case against the Sachin Pilot camp and the Governor declining to convene an emergency Assembly session, the Ashok Gehlot government has plunged into a deeper political crisis.
Currently, the Congress has a narrow lead over the opposition and is only one past the majority mark of 101 in the 200-member Rajasthan assembly. Team Pilot claims the support of 30 MLAs; however, there is evidence of only 19. The BJP has 72. Including smaller parties and independent members, the opposition has 97 at the moment.
Meanwhile, Congress workers staged demonstrations at several places in Rajasthan last week against the BJP, accusing it of “conspiring” to topple the Ashok Gehlot government.