Uttarakhand Chief Minister Tirath Singh Rawat
Amid row over by-polls, Uttarakhand Chief Minister Tirath Singh Rawat on Friday resigned from his post. He submitted his resignation to Governor Baby Rani Maurya. Rawat said he resigned from the post in view of the constitutional challenge that he was facing.
The BJP legislature party will meet at 3 pm on Saturday to choose a new leader for which sitting MLAs, Satpal Maharaj and Dhan Singh Rawat are said to be frontrunners. The two MLAs were called to Delhi on Friday by the BJP central leadership.
According to reports, Union Minister Narendra Singh Tomar will be the observer for the legislative party meeting to be held at Dehradun.
Earlier in the day, Rawat had met BJP chief JP Nadda for the second time in three days to discuss the political situation and the requirement of his election to the state Assembly before September 10.
In the meeting which lasted for nearly 30 minutes, the BJP chief explained to Rawat that Section 151 of Representation of the People Act, 1951 has created hindrance in his election to the Assembly.
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Rawat, who had met Nadda and Union Home Minister Amit Shah late on Wednesday night, is currently the MP from the Garhwal Lok Sabha seat, and as per the rules, needs to be sworn in as an elected MLA within six months of taking over as the Chief Minister.
Currently, two assembly seats -- Haldwani and Gangotri -- are lying vacant, but there is no clarity whether the bypolls will be held before the deadline.
Rawat said that holding by-polls will be decided by the Election Commission and he will follow whatever the Central leadership of the party decides.
(With agency inputs)
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