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Congress comeback in Arunachal Pradesh |
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Apang sworn in CM again
Veteran Congress leader and former Chief Minister Gegong Apang took over the reins of the state again after he was sworn in as Chief Minister for a record seventh time on October 16. State Governor V.C. Pande administered the oath of office to Apang at a simple ceremony at Darbar Hall in the Governor’s House in the state capital, Itanagar.
The BJP, which was deserted by Apang soon after the Congress led UPA Government took over in New Delhi, boycotted the oath-taking ceremony. The party which is making inroads in the troubled north east, has made significant improvement by winning nine Assembly seats against zero in the dissolved Assembly.
Soon after taking over as CM, Apang announced that he would demand a review of the constitution amendment restricting the size of his ministry to 20 per cent of the total seats in the Assembly.
The Chief Minister said an exception should be made for a multi-ethnic state like Arunachal Pradesh. To give proper representation to all ethnic communities, this limitation needs to be removed. Besides, we have 16 districts. There should be at least one minister representing each district, he explained.
Apang has been under severe pressure to pick 11 ministers out of the 34 legislators of the ruling Congress. According to the new rules, Arunachal Pradesh, with a 60-member Assembly, can have only 12 ministers.
A Congress source admitted that the Chief Minister was not being able to finalise his council of ministers, given the growing pulls for ministerial berths from different directions.
Though it is the Chief Minister’s prerogative to choose his council of ministers, Apang has left the selection to the high command, the source said. He is expected to visit New Delhi this week with the list of probable ministers for the high command’s approval. PCC president and former chief minister Mukut Mithi will accompany the Chief Minister. “I have to take party president Sonia Gandhi’s consent for the list of ministers”, Apang said.
In the Congress Legislature Party meeting, which unanimously elected him as its leader on Wednesday, Apang had said efficiency would be the criterion for obtaining a ministerial post.
On the question of creating a post of deputy chief minister, Apang said most Congress legislators were against such a post. “But as a disciplined member of the party, I shall follow the directive of the high command on the issue,” he added.
Listing his priorities, Apang said he would make Arunachal Pradesh a model state and would provide the state a clean, transparent and responsible government. He said a master plan for Itanagar and Pasighat would be prepared. Road connectivity would also be improved.
Backgrounder
The Congress victory in the Arunachal Pradesh Assembly election was a foregone conclusion after Gegong Apang, the former Chief Minister, rejoined the party last month. Although the party has won a comfortable majority, securing 34 of the 60 seats in the Assembly, the outcome leaves unresolved the Apang-Mithi rivalry. Since 1999, when Mithi first led a revolt against Apang, forcing him to resign as Chief Minister, an office he had held for a record 19 years, the two have been engaged in undoing each other. Their increasingly embittered personal tussle has dictated the political twists and turns in the State over the last few years. Although Mithi was none too happy to see his rival back in the party, the two had no choice but to shelve their differences during the election campaign.
The major “plus” point of Apang’s personality is that he knows knack of choosing the right party at the right time. Gegong Apang did precisely that by choosing to return to the Congress before the elections in Arunachal Pradesh. Not only has the Congress come back to power in the state, but Apang made it to see that he alone occupies the seat of power.
His action may have smacked of political opportunism, but that is hardly an issue in Indian elections. Winning the polls is all that matters.
As for the BJP, it has little moral right to complain about Apang’s party-hopping. Although the BJP had no member in the state assembly, it formed a government in Arunachal Pradesh when Apang, in his earlier somersault, got the majority of the Congress legislators to desert the Congress and join the BJP. Having been chief minister of the state for 20 uninterrupted years in his earlier regime, he is now set to outdo Jyoti Basu’s record of 23 years in power in West Bengal. The party-hopping will only be a footnote to his success story.
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