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North East: Meghalaya: Congress leader Lapang sworn in as Cm

	March 17, 2008

D.D. Lapang was on March 10 sworn in as Meghalaya chief minister after Governor S.S. Sidhu ignored a coalition’s claim and invit¬ed the Congress to form the government.



The Governor administered the oath of office and secrecy to Lapang and asked him to prove his majority on the floor of the 60-member legislature within 10 days.



The move came despite a combine of assorted parties claiming support of 33 legislators. The Congress has 25 MLAs.



“Governor SS Sidhu has gone by the book and invited Lapang as the leader of the largest single party to form the Government. He has been given 10 days’ time within which to prove his strength on the floor of the Assembly,” a Raj Bhawan official said.



Lapang said he would be able to prove his majority in the Assembly.



Earlier in the day, the newly formed Meghalaya Progressive Al¬liance (MPA) headed by United Democratic Party (UDP) leader Donkupar Roy and Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) veteran PA Sangma met the Governor and paraded 33 members to press him to invite the combine to form the new government.



The Governor, however, stuck to convention and invited the Con¬gress, the largest single party, to form the government. The tug of war began after former Lok Sabha Speaker Sangma came up with a masterstroke, halting what looked like a smooth sailing for the Congress.



He struck a power sharing deal with the UDP and the two parties managed to bring in all elected members belonging to regional parties and two independents into their fold.



Apart from 14 members from the NCP and 11 from the UDP, the MPA has with it two members from the Hill State People’s Democratic Party (HSPDP), one each from the Khun Hynnieutrip National Awak¬ening Movement and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and two Independents.



A last-ditch effort to effect a change of mind among the MPA partners by former Chief Minister S.C. Marak failed with Sangma turning down his request.



“I had contacted them to have a change of mind, but they said it was too late,” Marak disclosed. Marak, one of the few Chief Ministers who could complete his full five-year term from 1993, said if he had won the Assembly elections this time, the present impasse would not have arisen.



“I could have acted as the bridge between the Congress and the regional parties,” Marak said.



A State Congress source said if Marak had won the Resubelpara seat, the AICC would have preferred Marak to Lapang as the Con¬gress Legislative Party (CLP) leader as Marak would be able to bring about unity among the Congress legislators as well as the coali¬tion partners.



The regional parties agreed to be part of the MPA only because they did not want to work under Lapang, the source added.



Marak lost to NCP’s Timothy Shira by a narrow margin in the just-concluded Assembly elections. Congress leaders close to Marak admitted that factionalism in the Congress, with one group led by Lapang and the other by Mukul Sangma, had led to the defeat of Marak.



“Though they have their differences, both Lapang and Mukul Sangma did not want to see Marak emerging as the next leader,” a defeat¬ed Congress candidate from the Garo Hills said.



Marak, who was defeated in the 2003 elections because of the infighting within the Congress, said though he failed to convince the MPA to change their stand regarding the formation of the government, he would appeal to them to elect him to the Rajya Sabha.