Kalyan Singh Inducts 70 Ministers

The Kalyan Singh-led Uttar Pradesh government yesterday inducted 70 ministers, taking the total strength of the one-month-old ministry to 93.

In the first cabinet expansion after winning the trust motion on October 21, Singh yesterday inducted 26 cabinet and 44 ministers of state in his council of ministers. His ministrys strength had reduced to 23 after the BSP pulled out of the coalition government on October 19 last.

Meanwhile, former Chief Minister Mayawati yesterday claimed that the Kalyan Singh government was in a minority and requested President K R Narayanan to immediately dismiss the Bharatiya Janata Party ministry and dissolve the state assembly.

 

In a letter to the President, Mayawati alleged that the assembly speaker Kesri Nath Tripathi, was encouraging defections and was out to split the Bahujan Samaj Party.

I will request you to order a probe into the statements issued by the state assembly speaker and I am enclosing clippings of newspapers to prove my charge, the BSP vice-president said in her four-page letter, copies of which were released to the press.

Referring to the trial of strength in which the Kalyan Singh government reportedly got 222 votes, Mayawati alleged that it was quite clear that the voting was bogus and 12 BSP and three Congress votes were counted in an irregular manner in favour of the BJP government.

The speaker has, however, asserted that even without these 15 votes, the BJP government would have won the trust vote with support of 207 MLAs in the House with an effective strength of only 410. Mayawati contested the statement saying that the 15 votes couldnot be subtracted from the total 425-member strength of the House as these MLAs were present and had not boycotted or walked out of the House.

Urging the President to reconsider the issue, Mayawati said he must ensure justice to all the opposition parties and take steps to dismiss the BJP government and dissolve the state assembly.

Copies of the letter have also been sent to Prime Minister I K Gujral, home minister Indrajit Gupta and Governor Romesh Bandari.

Mayawati said she had submitted a representation to the speaker on October 24 saying the membership of all the 13 BSP MLAs who violated the partys whip to side with the BJP government be terminated under the anti-defection laws. But the speaker had not initiated any action on her representation and, instead, was engineering defections. She warned that if any of the BSP rebels were included in the Kalyan Singh cabinet, her party would take some drastic steps.

Mayawati said she had already faxed messages to the President informing him that the entire opposition was beaten up and thrown out of the House although they wanted to vote against the BJP government.

The BSP vice-president said the trouble began when she and other BSP members rose to protest against the presence of outsiders in the House. The ruling party members attacked them when they went to the well of the House, she charged.