Old Congress Warhorse Broke Gujarat Bjp

Jadeja is one of the best parliamentarians that Gujarat has produced. Besides being a cabinet minister in the state for over a decade, he has earned fame for his knowledge and ability to make skillful use of legislative laws, norms and convention.

Both the Congress and the Sankarsinh Vaghela group, which also included the MahaGujarat Janata Party led by Dilip Parikh, were desperate to find answers to a few questions. Some topnotch lawyers had been consulted. But some one well-versed with legislative practices was needed to guide them.

Jadeja was persuaded to come over to Gandhinagar from Rajkot where he resides. ( He also happens to be the ex-raja of Rajkot). Who managed to persuade the otherwise sulking Jadeja is still not known. There is really none in the Gujarat Congress whom Jadeja would listen to.

The political grapevine has it that the party high command, including Narsimha Rao, played a role in persuading him. The grapevine also had it that Amarsinh Chaudhary, the leader of the opposition in the assembly and former Congress Chief Minister, had long telephonic talks on the issue with not only Rao but also Prime Minister H D Deve Gowda.

As it became apparent by Sunday evening that the 18 MLAs who had been kept in the custody of five ministerial bungalows will stick to the BJP in the trial of strength, the Vaghela camp started a series of negotiations with the Congress on ways to cross the hurdle in the assembly.

It was also clear that the Speaker, H L Patel, who belongs to the BJP, was in no position to leave his sickbed at a private nursing home and preside over the assembly session. The alternative was the deputy speaker Chandubhai Dabhi, was belongs to the Congress.

The first thing Jadeja did on reaching Gandhinagar on Monday was to test the political waters. He found that 84 legislators including 28 BJP rebels, all the 44 Congress MLAs and 12 out of 14 independents would join hands to opposed the Mehta government in the Assembly. That left 95 MLAs with the BJP, including two independents.

The BJP seemed poised to win. Some way had to be found to split the BJP by recognising the rebels as a separate legislative group and adjourning the House before the confidence motion could be taken up. Jadeja joined strategy sessions with Congress leaders and Vaghela supporters that lasted several hours.

In the end, the following queries were put up to him:

Can the ruling BJP insist on the election of a new Speaker after securing Patel's resignation before moving the motion of confidence?

Is the deputy speaker's rulings as binding as that of the speaker?

Can the chair give its ruling on recognising a new group in assembly even before the first item on the agenda