The newly sworn in Nayab Singh Saini ministry in Haryana on Wednesday won the confidence motion in the Assembly through a voice vote after a two-hour discussion on the motion.
After the split with the BJP, the Jannayak Janata Party (JJP) had issued a whip, asking its 10 legislators to remain absent from the House during voting on the confidence motion. However, when the issue of trust vote was taken up, five of its MLAs left the House.
In the 90-member state Assembly, the BJP has 41 MLAs and it also enjoys the support of six of the seven independents as well as of lone Haryana Lokhit Party MLA Gopal Kanda.
The JJP has 10 MLAs in the House. The main Opposition Congress has 30 MLAs while the Indian National Lok Dal has one.
Meanwhile, as speculation was doing the rounds that he may contest the upcoming Lok Sabha polls from Karnal, former Haryana chief minister M L Khattar announced he was resigning as a member of the state Assembly.
Khattar, who represented the Karnal seat, said newly appointed Chief Minister Nayab Singh Saini will take care of the constituency.
The former chief minister made the announcement soon after the Nayab Saini government won the trust vote in the Assembly. Saini replaced Khattar as Haryana’s chief minister on Tuesday. “During the past nine-and-a-half years, I have served as the Leader of the House. I will serve the people of Haryana till my last breath,” Khattar said.
Jannayak Janta Party chief Ajay Singh Chautala said his party worked with full honesty to fulfil the ‘gathbandhan dharma’ over the last four and half years of the alliance and his party was never power hungry.
His statement came a day after JJP’s alliance with the BJP ended as Khattar was replaced with Nayab Singh Saini as the Haryana chief minister.
Chautala said his party had demanded two Lok Sabha seats in Haryana for the upcoming general election, but was refused by the BJP.
“I was also in Delhi the day before yesterday. Dushyant Chautala met BJP president J P Nadda (over seat sharing). We said we wanted to contest the two seats but they refused to give it,” he said.
Chautala said that he sent Dushyant Chautala back to the BJP leadership with the message that the JJP would not fight even a single seat if it fulfils the promise of Rs 5,100 per month under the Old Age Pension scheme and would support it in all 10 seats.