Unable to find a successor to the caretaker chief minister Biren Singh in Manipur, the state is likely to witness the president’s rule as the deadline for convening the assembly session comes closer. Ex-CM Biren Singh resigned on Sunday, last week. Since then the BJP has been conducting meetings with the party’s Northeast coordinator, Sambit Patra. Till now, the BJP has not issued any statement, but people aware of the matter reportedly say that the parties get to decide on Singh’s replacement.
Article 174
According to Article 174 of the constitution, the assembly must be convened again within six months of being adjourned. In this case, the deadline is February 12, 25, since the assembly last held its meeting on August 12, 2024. This happened as Biren Singh resigned on Sunday, a day before the state assembly was scheduled to convene a budget session. The resignation comes five days after the Supreme Court directed Central Forensics Lab for a report on leaked audio tapes that allegedly featured Biren Singh. In the audio tapes, Singh can be purportedly heard as saying that the ethnic violence in the state was instigated at his insistence.
As this deadline has finally approached, the president’s rule is becoming inevitable in a state that has been under brutal violence for nearly two years.
If the President’s rule is placed, the assembly will be placed in suspended animation but will not get dissolved completely. This will allow the assembly to be revived again at any time if it succeeds in forming a majority government, even as the President’s rule remains imposed on the state.
There has been no official statement from the Manipur CM office, Raj Bhavan and the Union Home Ministry. Singh continues to remain a caretaker CM while the political drama on manipur violence is in full swing.
