‘Congress has lost the mandate’: Himachal LoP Jai Ram Thakur meets Governor day after BJP’s Rajya Sabha win

“BJP candidate Harsh Mahajan won the Rajya Sabha election despite the Congress having massive majority in Vidhan Sabha… Right now, Congress government has no right to remain in power,” Thakur added.

The Congress, on its part, has dismissed the BJP’s claims. “We have not lost the trust. We got 34 votes and they got 34 votes. Six Congress MLAs did cross-voting,” Sukhu said on Tuesday. “Thirty-four MLAs showed their honesty. They were given various allurements. But, they showed character, morality, and honesty. Those MLAs are with us. The culture of Himachal does not allow this (cross-voting). The people of Himachal do not like this,” he added.

Mahajan, a former Congress leader, won the election for the lone Rajya Sabha seat in a draw of slips after both he and Congress’s Abhishek Manu Singhvi polled 34 votes each in the 68-member Assembly. Congress MLAs Rajinder Rana, Sudhir Sharma, Chaitanya Sharma, Inder Dutt Lakhanpal, Davinder Kumar Bhutto, and Ravi Thakur, and Independent legislators Ashish Sharma, K L Thakur, and Hoshyar Singh voted for Mahajan.

Thakur asserted, “If cross voting happens in Rajya Sabha, it is not invalid as per clear Election Commission’s guidelines.”

The LoP stated that he had apprised the Governor on “what all happened in the last two days”.

“During the Budget session, there is voting on cut motion. And if the Opposition is not convinced with the voice voting at the time, it has the right to seek division of votes,” Thakur said. A cut motion allows members of the House to oppose a demand in a Financial Bill being presented by the government.

“We requested for that (division of votes) twice, but were not heard and the House was adjourned. When we were going to meet the Speaker, marshals were made to stop us. Legislators were injured — it is unprecedented in the Himachal Vidhan Sabha. And after that, when we met the Speaker, he refuted he had deployed marshals. The security incharge, however, said it was done on the Speaker’s orders. It is unfortunate,” Thakur added.

The BJP leader also said the party is apprehensive that the “Speaker may suspend our MLAs from the house today to avoid division of votes”.

On Tuesday, state BJP president Rajeev Bindal told reporters that Congress has “no right to remain in power”. “We will meet the Governor in the morning to call for voting on the day of the vote on Budget. The government should step down,” he said.