PATNA, 10 June 2005 — Seventy-nine members of the dissolved Bihar Assembly yesterday left for New Delhi to present themselves before President A.P.J. Abdul Kalam today and express their resentment over the dissolution of the house.
JD(U) state general secretary Jnanendra Singh ‘Jnanu’ said 55 JD(U) members in the dissolved house had left for New Delhi on Tuesday while former LJP national principal secretary-general Nagmani, accompanied by four rebel LJP members left yesterday to Delhi.
BJP leader Aswini Kumar Choubey led a group of 20 members of his party to Delhi and Independent member of the dissolved house Jagdish Sharma claimed that 14 of the 17 independents would participate in the parade. Some former deputies would reach New Delhi directly from their constituencies, he added.
Leaders of breakaway faction of LJP Avdhesh Kumar Kushwaha and Vijay Kumar alias Munna Shukla said 132 members of the dissolved assembly would join the ‘parade of MLAs’.
At least 22 of the 29 LJP members in the dissolved house were aggrieved at the dissolution of the assembly even before the elected members were sworn in and all of them would march to President’s House with NDA members and independents supporting their cause, the leaders claimed.
The rebel LJP leaders have also collected written declaration of five members of the dissolved house extending support to NDA leader Nitish Kumar to form a government, Shukla added.
Meanwhile, Bihar Governor Buta Singh, who is under fire from the NDA for dissolving the state assembly on “false and fabricated” charge of horse-trading, has termed as a “democratic right” the NDA’s plan to parade the MLAs before the president.
“It is the democratic right of the MLAs,” was the terse reply of Buta Singh to queries by reporters here on NDA’s plan. “What I did (recommending dissolution of the house) is constitutionally, democratically and legally right”, he said.
