Nayab Singh Saini-led BJP Government in Haryana on Wednesday won the trust vote by voice vote in the State Assembly here, a day after he took oath as the new Chief Minister.

 The Jannayak Janata Party (JJP) MLAs left the House when the trust vote was taken up. The JJP had issued a whip, asking its 10 legislators to remain absent from the Assembly during voting on the confidence motion.

Speaker Gian Chand Gupta put the trust vote for voting by voice vote which the Saini Government won.  Former State Home Minister and senior BJP leader Anil Vij was present in the House.

During the voice vote, besides JJP’s 10 MLAs, lone legislator of the Indian National Lok Dal (INLD) was also not present in the House. Congress members asked Speaker Gupta to conduct voting through secret ballot but he refused saying there was no provision in the rules for the same.

Earlier, Saini had moved a motion to seek a vote of confidence in the Assembly. A two-hour discussion took place on the motion. Saini said, “Our Government not only has the trust of the MLAs, but we also have trust of the people of Haryana.”

JJP MLAs Devender Singh Babli, Ram Kumar Gautam, Ishwar Singh, Ram Niwas and Jogi Ram Sihag left the House when the trust vote was taken up.

In the 90-member State Assembly, the BJP has 41 members, and it also enjoys the support of six of the seven independents as well as of lone Haryana Lokhit Party MLA Gopal Kanda. The main opposition Congress has 30 MLAs.

The BJP was comfortably placed in Haryana Assembly even without the JJP’s support. The BJP named Saini as Haryana’s new Chief Minister on Tuesday, hours after the surprise resignation of Manohar Lal Khattar from the post along with his cabinet ministers.

During the discussion on the trust vote, Chief Minister Saini praised Khattar for the works undertaken during his nine-year-long tenure. He said it is his first day in the House as Chief Minister and Leader of the House.

Before the Chief Minister moved the confidence motion, Congress MLAs sought to know from Speaker Gupta about the urgency of convening the Assembly session. “There was no emergency,” senior Congress leader Bhupinder Singh Hooda said and claimed that proper time was not given to the MLAs.

Party MLA B B Batra asked, “What was the urgency of convening the session?”  Hooda asked the Speaker to adjourn the session for at least one hour so that the legislators could reach the assembly. To this, the Speaker said it was the duty of the members to reach the House on time.