JPC meet next week; all eyes on JD(U)

Congress support to JD(U) in Bihar Assembly today lends a new dimension to the much-delayed meeting of the JPC on 2G scam to be held next week to discuss adoption of the controversial draft report that gave a clean chit to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Finance Minister P Chidambaram.
JD(U), which has two members in the 30-member JPC, could tilt the balance in favour of Congress in the numbers game in the sharply divided committee since it has parted ways with BJP. Earlier, JD(U), as part of NDA, had rejected the draft report.
Congress could now try to convince JD (U) to side with it in the committee after its four MLAs in the Bihar Assembly sided with Nitish Kumar during the Trust Vote today.

Fifteen members from Opposition parties, including BJP, JD (U), and former UPA allies DMK and Trinamool Congress, had earlier written separate letters to Lok Sabha Speaker Meira Kumar contending that they have "no confidence" in the JPC Chairman and had appealed to her to immediately remove him.
They had also rejected the draft report "in toto."
JPC Chairman P C Chacko said here that the panel would meet sometime next week. "Members have been busy so far. We plan to meet sometime next week," he told reporters here.
The JPC has not met since February due to sharp differences with Opposition members demanding Chacko's removal. A meeting was last scheduled on April 25 to adopt the draft report but it could not take place because of the death of a sitting Lok Sabha member.