The Hindu : `Midnight guests' from Maharashtra

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Jun 07, 2002

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`Midnight guests' from Maharashtra

By Lalit Shastri

BHOPAL JUNE 6. The political crisis in Maharashtra ignited by the defection of some MLAs to the Opposition took a dramatic turn when more than 40 MLAs belonging to the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) were brought to Indore by a chartered flight shortly after midnight on Wsdnesday night.

Reports received here said the Indore Collector and some Government officials were waiting at the airport, along with the Indore Congress president, Ujagar Singh, and the Chairman of Indore Development Authority, Kripa Shankar Shukla, to receive the "guests" from Maharashtra. A fleet of luxury cars and a few buses had also been arranged to ferry the NCP legislators to the hotel directly from the tarmac, breaking all security rules.

There was tight police security at Hotel President, where the NCP MLAs had been put up for the night. Some of the newsmen on the trail found it difficult to break the security cordon at the airport as well as at the hotel. Talking to a group of newsmen this morning, the Maharashtra State NCP president, B.R. Pachpute, said that his party MLAs were in the grip of tension as they were receiving threatening calls and offers of huge pay-off from the BJP-Shiv Sena Opposition. It was on the MLAs' demand that they had been moved out of Mumbai and brought to Indore, he said denying the charge that they were being held "hostage" at the behest of the party bosses. He told newsmen that 51 MLAs had come to Indore, along with nine Cabinet Ministers and four Ministers of State.

Later today, the MLAs had left for some undisclosed destination.

The Collector, when contacted around 4.30 pm, said he was unaware of their whereabouts but admitted that police security had been provided to the Maharashtra MLAs due to the prevailing security environment in the city, hinting at the strong protest lodged by the activists of the Bharatiya Janata Party. Incidentally, the BJP national president, Jana Krishnamurthy was also in Indore today.

The Collector said the Indore Inspector-General of Police would be able to tell where exactly the MLAs had been taken. But the IG would not give a categorical reply and was not later available for comment.

The Indore Collector, however, told The Hindu that some of the MLAs were staying in Hotel Sayaji and some were put up in Hotel Taj.

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`Midnight guests' from Maharashtra