Jharkhand Governor CP Radhakrishnan today rejected allegations of former Chief Minister Hemant Soren and his party that the latter’s arrest was orchestrated by the Centre in connivance with Raj Bhawan. The governor said that all democratic norms were followed in the formation of the new government in the State and even at the time of his arrest Hemant Soren had cited in his letter that he was resigning as he was being arrested by the Enforcement Directorate.
Speaking to media persons at Raj Bhawan on Thursday the Governor said that on January 31, “ED called our Principal Secretary to that we have taken the custody of the Chief Minister and the CM is requesting us to complete his constitutional obligation of resigning, so we are coming to Raj Bhawan so that he would resign. The CMO also informed us that he is going to resign today… I was waiting for 3 hours … then the Chief Secretary called us and said he was the CM and he could not come alone. Please allow some of our senior ministers to come along with him. So I said okay let me take 3 people.. Later they requested us to allow more people we allowed more. We never said who should come, who should not come.”
“But nobody told us they are coming to Raj Bahwan to claim the right to form the next government. Hemant Soren asked me to accept the resignation letter and I asked the Principal Secretary to type the acceptance letter. That time 2-3 people were standing here. I don’t know whether they were from ED or not. Then immediately they said that they were claiming to form the next government without informing them earlier. They gave me the claim letter,” said Radhakrishnan.
“They told me that out of 47 legislators, 43 MLAs have supported them. I told them tomorrow I would call them. It will take a little time to conclude, but we did not take much time. I called Champai Soren the next day at 11 PM and handed over the letter of invitation. At the time of giving the invitation, we gave them a sufficient time of 10 days. They said we wanted to take oath tomorrow morning and we agreed on that too. We never asked them to prove their majority in 24 hours. So where is the question of wishes of Raj Bhawan coming, I do not know that,” said the Governor.
Radhakrishnan said that every democratic norm has been very strictly followed by the Raj Bhawan. “The former CM himself agreed in his letter that he was taken into custody by ED, so I wanted to resign. I don’t even know the ED people, I don't even recognise any of them,” he said.
“We took legal advice …what is to be done. This was a peculiar situation where the CM was not seen… it came in the newspapers that he was not traceable,” he said.
On the allegation of Hemant Soren that Ra Bahwan was involved in his arrest, he said, “If you are going on telling a lie that has to be explained. Did the Raj Bhawan ask him to resign? It is the CMO who told us the CM is going to resign. In his letter, he clearly said I am resigning as I have been taken into custody by ED. Was Nitish Kumar taken into custody by the ED? Did Nitish Kumar disappear for two days?”
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