Meghalaya Chief Minister DD Lapang resigns before trust vote

Before the trust vote was set in motion on Wednesday, the Chief Minister of Meghalaya D D Lapang resigned from the post saying his government was unable to meet the required strength.

His resignation came when Governor S S Sidhu invited him to prove his majority to form the government in the state. The decision was taken in a Congress Legislative Party’s (CLP) meeting held before the trust vote.

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After the meeting Lapang said, “Congress could not get the requisite support, so the CLP decided I should resign.”

The CLP during the election emerged as the single largest party after claiming 25 seats in the 60 member house, the party managed to get support from the other three independent members as a result the tally increased to 28. Even after having 28 candidates, CLP is lack of two candidates to fulfill the desirable number of strength in the house.

Earlier Lapang proposal to conduct floor test before the election of Speaker also invited protest from the MPA.

The opposition Meghalaya Progressive Alliance (MPA) led by National Congress Part with the support from regional parties and independents members has claimed to have strength of 31 MLA’s and are sure to form the government.

P A Sangma, the prominent leader of NCP said that MPA will claim to form the government after holding meeting with MPA members.

Reportedly Lapang said that their party will form government in the sate while citing MPA as a bundle of contradiction and will not last more than three months.

Lapang who was sworn in as the Chief Minister after the Governor invited the single largest party with 28 members instead of giving chance to the MPA with 31 members drew controversy.

The MPA dragged this matter to Supreme Court which refused to intervene at that stage. The plea filed by C K Sangma son of P A Sangma challenged Governor’s decision to invite the Congress and asked to reduce the floor test period from 10 days.

A three-member bench headed by Chief Justice K G Balakrishnan including Justice R V Raveendran and Dalveer Bhandari had fixed March 24 as date of next hearing.