Rawat using money, muscle power to dominate: Jaju

It seems that the long-standing Uttarakhand crisis will finally come to an end as the Supreme Court is set to announce the outcome of the floor test on Wednesday. The Congress is claiming its victory over the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). Sources said deposed CM Harish Rawat enjoyed the support of 27 Congress legislators, besides six PDF members and a rebel BJP MLA.

However, Congress’ victory would cost dearly to the BJP. Opposition leaders said people were aware of the BJP’s “ominous” plan to implement its agenda of “Congress mukt Bharat” in Arunachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand .  

In an interview with Millennium Post, BJP in-charge of Uttarakhand  Shyam Jaju lashed out at Rawat and called him as “dominating” leader. He alleged that Rawat used “money and muscle” even within the party.

Asked on the BJP’s flawed strategy on the floor test, Jaju said: “There is nothing that went wrong with our strategy. We are in the opposition and we will play our role in the democracy.”

On Monday, the Apex Court barred the nine rebel MLAs from casting their votes. This is seen as a major setback for the BJP, a charge that the state party in-charge rubbished, saying that they could not stake majority in the Assembly due to lack of numbers.

There was a serious allegation against Vijay Bahuguna, former Chief Minister of Uttarakhand, and BJP leader Kailash Vijayvargiya of accepting money from a Delhi-based real estate company, Indiabulls, 

for favours. 

However, Jaju rubbished the charge and said, “Indiabulls has nothing to do with the Uttarakhand crisis. It is Vijay Bahuguna, who is the former CM of the state and rebelled from the Assembly on March 18 and supported us. So, it is his support that matters.”

Recently, Bahujan samaj party (BSP) supremo Mayavati also lent her support to the Congress on the raging Uttarakhand crisis and it also came as one of the setbacks for the BJP. 

While political observers are speculating an alliance between the Congress and the BSP, the BJP leader asserts that “the party is growing stronger and the other political parties are assembling together to oppose the BJP. We expected that a leader like Mayavati ji will support us on the issue on corruption in Uttarakhand. But she took the side of Congress.” He added, “ Everybody knows Congress’ stand in Uttar Pradesh, where they got only two seats out of 80. So we are not afraid.”