Kamal Nath forwards governor's letter on floor test to Speaker

BHOPAL: Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Kamal Nath on Tuesday forwarded to the Assembly Speaker for "appropriate decision", the latest ultimatum to him by state Governor Lalji Tandon on holding a trust vote.

On the governor's warning that failure to hold a floor test would mean the government did not have a majority, Nath told him that Opposition BJP leaders had already approached the Supreme Court over the issue.

Nath in the letter to Tandon reiterated his request that the 16 Congress MLAs "held captive" by the BJP should be brought back so that they could take an "independent" decision during a floor test.


"Let the 16 MLAs, who have been held captive, be released. Let them live in their respective houses for 5-7 days without any fear so that they can take an independent decision, his letter said.

"If the BJP is alleging that I don't have a majority in the assembly then they should move a no-confidence motion to prove that," he added.

Governor Tandon had on Monday sent a second letter to the CM asking him to take a floor test within a day after his first one was not followed and the House adjourned till March 26 over the coronavirus scare.

Following this, former chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan and nine BJP MLAs moved the Supreme Court, and the matter is set to be heard on March 18.

Crisis hit the Kamal Nath government last week after senior leader Jyotiraditya Scindia crossed over to the BJP and 22 of his loyalists in the Congress resigned from the Assembly.