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Sharat Pradhan in Lucknow
Dissatisfied legislators of the Bharatiya Janata Party and disgruntled independents supporting the Mayawati-led government in Uttar Pradesh are planning to meet Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee on his two-day visit to Lucknow beginning Saturday to express their grievances about the recent Cabinet expansion.
As many as 20 of the BJP's 98 Members of Legislative Assembly in Uttar Pradesh's 403-member house were closeted on Friday to chalk out their strategy for apprising Vajpayee about their resentment.
Likewise, at least 12 of the 18 independent legislators met under the leadership of Raghuraj Pratap Singh, better known as Raja Bhaiya, the feudal lord-turned-don-turned politician from Pratapgarh, to crystallise their complaints.
The two groups are resentful of what they termed as 'arbitrary' manner of expansion of the five-month old Mayawati Cabinet whose strength was raised from 23 to 79 last week.
The dissidents include many who had been ministers in the past BJP regimes, but were left out this time.
Vajpayee arrives on Saturday noon to launch the Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited's mobile service in his constituency. He will also dedicate the recently laid extension of the Haldia-Barauni-Kanpur gas pipeline to Lucknow.
State BJP president Vinay Katiyar has rushed to New Delhi after his warning to the dissidents went unheeded. Lalji Tandon, the state's Housing and Urban Development Minister, has followed suit. Both are expected to brief Vajpayee and try to limit the damage that might be wrought by the dissidents.
Katiyar had earlier issued show-cause notice to some half-a-dozen legislators who had voiced their resentment about the expansion. "That amounts to indiscipline," Katiyar had warned.
But unmindful of the reprimand, the visibly defiant legislators chose to huddle up and thrash out their action plan to take their grievances to the PM's court.
"We have sought an appointment with the PM, but the local organisers [read Tandon] have yet to respond to our request," remarked Ganga Bhakt Singh, a senior BJP MLA, who had sent his resignation to Katiyar on the day of the expansion.
While Singh declined to disclose the line of action they proposed to take, it was reliably learnt that the consensus was on demanding the resignation of all the BJP ministers.
"Well, what is wrong if all BJP ministers stepped down and we support the Mayawati government from outside?" asked another senior BJP legislator, who held key portfolios in successive BJP regimes.
Similarly, independents, who were earlier represented by Raja Bhaiya as a Cabinet minister, are asking, "Why should we be supporting a government where we do not even have a representation?" The official line that Raja Bhaiya was kept out because of his alleged criminal background does not gel with them. One independent legislator asked, "Then how have the others with similar background been given berths in the Cabinet?"
Meanwhile, Mayawati has said she is willing to add more members to her jumbo-sized Cabinet.
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