CHANDIGARH: Himachal Pradesh PWD Minister Vikramaditya Singh on Friday met the rebel Congress lawmakers disqualified from the assembly, indicating that the turbulence in the Congress still continues and uncertainty remains over the Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu-led government.
Chief Minister Sukhu however claimed that he had told Vikramaditya to meet the six rebel Congress MLAs after knowing that some of them want to return to the party.
The six MLAs were disqualified by the speaker under the anti-defection law after they cross-voted in the Rajya Sabha polls. Sukhu said Vikramaditya had informed him that some of the Congress rebels had approached him and wished to come back.
“I told Vikramaditya Singh to talk to these rebel MLAs and the Congress central leadership. The family members of these rebel MLAs were talking to them, and they want to be in the Congress,’’ the chief minister said.
Sources said Vikramaditya met the rebel MLAs at a hotel in Chandigarh. Two rebels reportedly did not meet Vikramaditya. “These rebel legislators have accepted their mistake so their coming back to the party fold should be reconsidered as anything is possible in politics,” a party leader said wishing not to be named.
Some party leaders said Vikramaditya, son of former CM Virbhadra Singh, was on his way to Delhi to meet Union minister Nitin Gadkari, adding that the minister might meet senior Congress leadership before taking his further step. In another indication of discontent in the Congress unit, Vikramaditya’s mother and state Congress president Prabitbha Singh said, “A lot of things remain to be done in the Congress. As an MP, I keep visiting my constituency and try to interact with the local people and solve their problems. It is from their feedback that I have come to understand that the saffron party’s working in the constituencies has been better than ours,” she said.
Reacting to the meeting with the rebels, Bhupinder Hooda, who with DK Shivakumar and Bhupesh Baghel was deployed as a trouble-shooter, said everything was fine. “Minor differences keep occurring. Government will run its full term and the party will fight Lok Sabha elections unitedly,” he said.
