Is Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister and YSR Congress Party (YSRCP) chief YS Jagan Mohan Reddy on the defensive? Why is he going back on few prestigious bills that were introduced in the state assembly a year ago? Is he planning for something much bigger? Or is he feeling the heat of certain decisions? Whatever is the reason, Jagan is looking much weaker than what he was few months ago and these repealing of bills have added to the observations!
Just a day after withdrawing the AP Decentralisation and Inclusive Development of all Regions Act and the CRDA Repeal Act, the Jagan-led state government took another key decision as the Andhra Pradesh Legislative Assembly adopted a resolution withdrawing the earlier resolution for abolition of the AP Legislative Council, to continue the existing Council.
This means MLCs can continue and most of them already elected were relieved. As we all are aware, the state government had passed a statutory resolution in its state assembly on January 27, 2020, under Article 169 of the Constitution of India, requesting the Centre to abolish the state legislative council. AP Assembly the other day passed a resolution to keep the council and proposed to withdraw the previous statutory resolution it made in January, 2020.
The CM who was furious with the existence of Council since many bills were held up at the Legislative council without YSRCP getting majority and decided to do away with Council. Especially when the three capitals bills was introduced, it was not passed in Council since YSRCP had only nine MLCs while the opposition Telugu Desam Party (TDP) had 33 MLCs out of the total 58. This meant that the upper hand in the Council is TDP and so it turned into thorn in the flesh for Jagan!
Also Read: TS MLC Polls: Cong to contest 5 Seats!
Now that the MLC seats are falling vacant and election notification has been issued by the Election Commission of India (ECI), Jagan seems to have thought that it would be better to hold the Council because slowly the majority in the Council will be YSRCP, wiping out the TDP. The tables have been turned in favour of the YSRCP, where it has 20 members and 12 seats are vacant. The YSRCP is set to win 11 of the seats when elections will be held to the MLC posts under the local area constituencies (LAC) category.
Also Read: AP Rains: No relief yet in sight!