Jyotiraditya Scindia quits Congress, 22 MLAs resign; Madhya Pradesh government crisis deepens

Chief
minister Kamal Nath’s government in Madhya Pradesh (MP) was plunged into crisis
on Tuesday when 22 Congress legislators, including six ministers, tendered their
resignations. The development followed senior leader Jyotiraditya Scindia
announcing his resignation from Congress minutes after Scindia met Prime
Minister Narendra Modi along with Union home minister and Bharatiya Janata
Party’s (BJP) former national president, Amit Shah, in Delhi.

While the
Congress legislature party passed a resolution supporting Nath on Tuesday
evening, BJP legislators were flown from Bhopal to Delhi.

On Tuesday,
six ministers also resigned from Nath’s cabinet: Health minister Tulsi Silavat;
food and civil supplies minsiter Pradyumn Singh Tomar; labour minister Mahendra
Singh Sisodia; transport minister Govind Singh Rajput; women and child
development minister Imarti Devi; and school education minister Prabhuram
Chauhdary. In a letter to the governor, sent on Tuesday, chief minister Kamal
Nath sought the immediate removal of the six.

Most of the
Congress legislators who resigned have been incommunicado since Monday night
and are in Bengaluru. The CLP further said that the BJP feared the “tough
action” taken by the state on issues like e-tendering and the scam involving
examinations conducted by Vyaysayik Pareeksha Mandal (Vyapam).

Meanwhile,
former chief minister of MP and BJP’s national vice-president Shivraj Singh
Chouhan described Tuesday’s developments as “an internal matter of the
Congress.”