Congress appoints Digvijaya Singh’s loyalist as Leader of Opposition in MP, sidelines reserved category contenders

Bhopal / Sidelining the claim of the SC, ST and OBC candidates, Congress high command appointed senior-most party MLA Dr Govind Singh as the Leader of Opposition (LoP) in Madhya Pradesh Assembly on Thursday.

Dr Singh is a seventh-term MLA and represents the Lahar constituency of Bhind district in the Assembly. He belongs Kshatriya community and is considered a hardcore supporter of Rajya Sabha MP and former chief minister Digvijaya Singh. Before this, former CM Kamal Nath resigned from the post of Leader of Congress Legislature Party(CLP) on the same day. Nath had been handling the post since Congress’s government was toppled in the state along with the state party chief.

Accepting Nath’s resignation, the party’s interim president Sonia Gandhi approved Govind Singh’s name as an LoP.
In a letter, Congress general secretary KC Venugopal wrote to Kamal Nath, “This is to inform you that Hon’ble Congress President has accepted your resignation from the post of Leader, Congress Legislature Party, Madhya Pradesh with immediate effect. The party wholeheartedly appreciates your contribution as the CLP Leader, Madhya Pradesh.” Congress president has also approved the proposal to appoint Dr Singh as a Leader of CLP, stated in the letter.

“I welcome the party high command decision. If the party win the upcoming 2023 Assembly elections, the participation in the leadership has to give to the SC, ST and OBCs categories leaders while the BJP is giving weightage to them because the State has a vast population of the reserved categories,” Congress’ working president of the State, Ramniwas Rawat told The Sun Today.

Former ministers and senior party MLAs Sajjan Singh Verma and Bala Bachchan who belongs to Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe communities respectively were also in the race for the LoP post in the state. Verma and Bachchan are considered very close to Nath in state politics. While the ruling BJP is focusing on the reserved category keeping the upcoming Assembly elections, the Congress stepped to appoint a Kshatriya as the LoP ignoring the SC, ST and Other backwards Classes. Now the LoP and Congress State chief both to be from an unreserved group.

In the 230 membered State Assembly 82 seats are reserved for SC and ST categories and the state has around 55 per cent OBCs population. A BJP leader questioned a Kshatriya politician’s appointment as the CLP leader, “This development has exposed once again that while the Congress does politics in the name of SC, ST and OBC, it doesn’t trust them while making appointments to major posts”.

Dr Singh started his political journey with the Samajwadi ideology and was elected first time MLA on the Janta Dal ticket in 1990 later he joined the Congress.