In a retaliatory move against what happened in the Assembly on Friday evening, the Harish Rawat Government has decided to terminate the tenure of the State’s Advocate General Uma Kant Uniyal who is the elder brother of one of nine dissident Congress MlAs Subodh Uniyal who have joined hands with the BJP to topple the Government. They would request the Governor to terminate him with immediate effect. Making things clear, Chief Minister Harish Rawat said after presiding over a Cabinet meeting at the secretariat on Saturday said that they had lost faith in Uniyal.
Notably, Uniyal was appointed as an advocate general by the former Chief Minister Vijay Bahuguna. After the change of guard in the State with Harish Rawat taking the reins from Bahuguna, MlA Subodh Uniyal, deemed as a close confidante of Bahuguna, was denied cabinet birth. His brother enjoying the cabinet minister’s status being the AG of the State was cited for keeping him out of the cabinet.
Now, as expected, the Chief Minister and his coterie, engaged in dousing the fire of rebellion engulfing the government, would go to any length to quell the rebellion and to scare others, sitting on the fence, away from the rebels, Congress insiders said.
Political analysts said that the move against Uniyal was on the cards. “With Vijay Bahuguna exerting pressure over the Harish Rawat to induct his two of his acolytes- Subodh Uniyal and Dr Shailendra Mohan Singhal- into his cabinet, Chief Minister was being forced to humour the high command into stalling things. Patience of the Bahuguna camp seemed to be wearing thin as the CM kept on keeping the cabinet expansion issue in the backburner, something that prompted Bahuguna and his followers-nine MlAs- to go all out against the CM and his camp,” one of the observers said.
Another said that the drama would unfold further in the coming days as more MlAs, disgruntled with CM, would jump ship and switch to the rebel camp at the opportune time.
The rebel MlAs aside from Vijay Bahuguna are-Harak Singh Rawat, Dr Shailendra Mohan Singhal, Umesh Sharma Kau, Subodh Uniyal, Prem Batra, Amrita Rawat, Shailarani Rawat and Kunwar Pranav Singh Champion. They were seen storming into the well of the House, shouting slogans against the Harish Rawat government and in favour of the BJP on Friday night.