Suspense on Soren's fate

Ranchi: Political temperatures have risen in Jharkhand as the ruling JMM-Congress-RJD alliance and the Opposition BJP await Governor Ramesh Bais next move about the Election Commission's opinion on a plea seeking Chief Minister Hemant Soren's disqualification as an MLA for allegedly violating electorals law.

The poll panel's opinion in the matter was sent to the Jharkhand Raj Bhavan in a sealed cover on Thursday morning, sources there said. Bains, who was in New Delhi, is understood to have reached Ranchi by Thursday afternoon.

The BJP, the petitioner in the case, has sought Soren's disqualification under section 9 A of the Representation of the People Act, 1951 -- which deals with disqualification for government contracts -- for allegedly extending a mining lease to himself.

"No communication in this regard has been received by the Chief Minister's Office from either the Election Commission or Governor Ramesh Bais," Chief minister Hemant Soren's secretariat said, according to PTI. "It apparently seems that BJP leaders including a BJP MP and his puppet journalists have themselves drafted the ECI report, which is otherwise a sealed cover report," Soren said in a statement issued by his secretariat. "This blatant misuse of constitutional authorities and public agencies and its complete takeover by BJP HQ in Deendayal Upadhay Marg in this shameful manner is unseen in Indian Democracy," he said.

The chief minister is apprised of several media reports about ECI sending a report to the governor "apparently recommending his disqualification as a MLA", his office said.

State Rural Development and Parliamentary Affairs Minister Alamgir Alam ruled out any threat to the ruling coalition in the state and said "even in the probability of Soren, who is also the JMM executive president, being disqualified from Assembly in an office of profit case, there is no threat to the government".

"It is a policy matter. Our government will continue. Hemant Soren continues to be our leader," he said.

BJP MP Nishikant Dubey, talking to PTI, said his party "wants a mid-term poll" in the state. "The Election Commission letter has reached the governor...I had announced that It will be done within August," he tweeted earlier in the day.

The JMM has 30 MLAs in the 81-member Assembly, the Congress 17 legislators, and the RJD one. The main opposition BJP has 26 MLAs in the House.

Under Article 192 of the Constitution, if any question arises as to whether a member of a House of the Legislature of a state has become subject to any of the disqualifications, the question shall be referred to the governor whose decision shall be final.