Battle continues within MSCP

IMPHAL, February 16: While a new government has been installed in the state, the battle continued inside the Manipur State Congress Party (MSCP) with a meeting of MSCP legislators held at 3 p.m. today at the residence of Speaker S Dhananjoy Singh unanimously resolving to reunite the party legislators even as the Nipamacha group of the MSCP resolved to expel the eight MLA s led by Hemanta who were at the camp of the People's Front. The meeting of MSCP legislators which was held at the residence of Speaker S Dhananjoy Singh was presided over by the party working president and union minister of state for food processing T Chaoba Singh. It was attended by 23 legislators including the Speaker himself. The meeting resolved that "all the internal misunderstandings between the two groups - one led by party president W Nipamacha and the other by working president T Chaoba - and consequent activities like expulsions and counter-expulsions etc. be settled amicably without any prejudice in order to strengthen the MSCP". Thereafter, the legislators went ahead to take up the resolution for reunion with the W Nipamacha Singh group. Shortly after the meeting, working president Chaoba, while speaking to newspersons, said his group is trying to band together the 23 MLAs of the party with the eight MLAs including Nipamacha who were expelled from the party and were declared unattached by the Speaker. If the reunion is brought about, the total number of party MLAs would become 32, he said. When asked if the MSCP, having largest strength and full majority, was planning to topple the newly sworn-in government led by Radhabinod Koijam, T Chaoba denied having any such plan and said the party would continue to support the Radhabinod Koijam-led government. On the other hand, on the heels of the adoption of the resolution for reunion by the 23 MLAs, the eight MLAs led by M Hemanta, former YAS minister, who recently defected from the ex-Chief Minister W Niparnacha Singh's camp have been declared expelled from the primary membership of the MSCP for a period of six years for their 'anti-party activities'. The MSCP vice-president, G Joykumar Sharma, who spoke to the IFP on the phone, disclosed that the decision for expulsion was unanimously taken during an emergency meeting of the disciplinary action committee of the MSCP led by W Nipamacha Singh at the residence of former IFCD minister H Bidur early this evening. They have been expelled for antiparty activities under the Article 9(4)D of the party constitution. He also said this decision has been intimated to Governor Ved Marwah, Speaker S Dhananjoy and other party leaders.