Jharkhand: NDA all set to win trust vote

The National Democratic Alliance, led by Arjun Munda, is all set to win the trust motion in the Jharkhand assembly on Tuesday.

It has the support of five Independents -– the 36-member NDA needs them in order to touch the magic figure of 41 in the 81-member assembly –- and is counting on Nationalist Congress Party legislator Kamlesh Kumar Singh to help prop up the government's strength.

The NCP has already issued a fresh whip to Singh – who is its sole legislator in the state -- asking him not to vote for the NDA. But Singh has not yet made his position clear.

"We will ask the speaker to disqualify him if he supports the NDA or abstains from voting," NCP leader Tariq Anwar told rediff.com in New Delhi. "If the speaker does not do that we will approach the courts," he said.

Singh was among those to take oath when the Shibu Soren government was sworn in.

Anwar said reports indicating that the Jharkhand unit of the party could merge with one of the NDA constituents in order to escape the anti-defection law were false. "That cannot happen. Anyway, let us see what takes place in the assembly," he said.

The Congress, meanwhile, is resigned to the fact that it will have to lie low in Jharkhand for some time.

"I don't think any more drama is going to take place tomorrow [Tuesday]," said Anis Durrani, convener, All India Congress Committee, on Monday. "Let the dust settle down."

"We have got nothing but bad name for all that we have done," one of the party workers said. "If we do anything more it will get worse. For the moment let things go on the way they are going."

In any case, most Congress leaders, who were camping in Ranchi ever since the results were announced, are now in New Delhi and will give the trust vote a miss. Among them is Priyaranjan Dasmunsi, the architect of the UPA's current misery. Also in the capital is Jharkhand Mukti Morcha chief Soren.

Meanwhile, Singh, who was discharged from a private hospital on request on Monday evening, was hospitalised again late in the night.

"He has been taken to Rajendra Institute of Medical Sciences," family sources said on Tuesday. They said his condition was stable, but he was still too weak.

The sources said they were not sure if Singh would attend the assembly session.