Facing heat,Gogoi claims Ajmal bid to topple him

“Badruddin Ajmal has been trying to remove me from the CM’s post. He wants to make a newfound friend of his the CM,” said Gogoi,adding that this “friend” is from the Congress itself.

Addressing a press conference here on Saturday,Gogoi said: “I wish Ajmal good luck. He has been seeking Allah’s blessings to remove me from the CM’s post. Now he has got new friends,and he is trying to make one of them CM.”

Asked who this “new friend” was,Gogoi replied: “How can he be from a party other than Congress? Even if Ajmal gets me removed,the next person has to be from the Congress,because we have absolute majority.”

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Interestingly,senior Congress leader and former minister Ripun Bora too issued a statement saying an “over-ambitious” minister in the government was dreaming of toppling Gogoi to become the CM. “I will not name him. Everybody knows who he is.” Bora added: “The same person who conspired against me by offering a huge sum to a CBI officer to trap me when I was education minister,is now trying to topple Gogoi.”

Meanwhile,Ajmal continued his tirade against the government. “Gogoi should resign. If he does not quit,we will put pressure on the Centre to remove him,” he said in New Delhi. Asked who could be the next CM if Gogoi is removed,the AUDF leader replied: “The Congress has 78 members in the Assembly. Won’t there be even one who is fit to fill the vacancy?”

Sonia,Shinde in Kokrajhar today

UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi and Union Home Minister Sushilkumar Shinde will arrive in Assam on Monday to make an on-the-spot assessment of the ground situation in Kokrajhar and the adjoining districts where over 4 lakh people were displaced in a series of violence since July 20. The visit comes at a time when a majority of the people lodged in relief camps are not willing to return to their villages unless the government provided them with foolproof security. Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi has said his government would soon announce a judicial probe into the violence. The CBI has already taken up seven of the 309 cases registered so far and seven separate teams are arriving here on Monday to begin investigations. ENS