Year 2016 is all set to turn a thing of the past as the people would ring in 2017 on Sunday. However, the year that is passing would never cease to haunt the mind of the State, for it is marked with momentous events in the political theater of the State.
Things started happening thick and fast since March when the State plunged into a deep political crisis that resulted in the President’s Rule and its revocation with the reinstatement of the Harish Rawat Government through the intervention of the judiciary. It is well-known across the country how things unfolded as nine Congress leaders, including the former Chief Minister Vijay Bahuguna and Cabinet Minister Harak Singh Rawat, turned rebels in the Assembly when the State appropriation bill was being passed on the evening on March 18. The rebels were later disqualified under anti-defection law. The case pending before the Supreme Court, the rebels switched to BJP.
However, the crisis was preceded by another one that resulted from the BJP rally on March 14. The saffron party MlA Ganesh Joshi allegedly beat a state mounted police horse Shaktimaan and fractured one of its limbs with lathi blows. The MlA was later arrested with the hapless equine struggling to survive the blow amidst stinging condemnation of the cruel act of the MlA.
later, the horse died despite all-out efforts being made by veterinaries coming from across the world to restore its fractured leg to normalcy.
Another drama followed in less than a month since the Harish Rawat government was reinstated. A Rajya Sabha election was necessitated after BJP MP Tarun Vijay’s term ended. Intent on wresting the seat from the BJP, the only one it had in the Upper House, CM Rawat nudged a BJP MlA Dan Singh Bhandari to switch sides. However, he quit the Assembly before the voting took place. His defection all the same sent shivers down the BJP spine on the eve of the election. BJP lost the election to Congress, thanks to the CM managing to keep the flocks together, including the fairly vulnerable six PDF MlAs.
CM weathered another monumental challenge in the thick of the rebels-triggered crisis when he was caught on sting camera talking to a tout to broker a deal with the dissidents. He was shown purportedly as offering bribe o the rebels to win them back to his camp. CBI stepped into the scene with alacrity by opening a case to probe the alleged involvement in the matter.
It still hangs on to the CM like Albatross with the central investigative agency following it with a gusto, supposedly at the behest of the Centre that is hostile to the Harish Rawat dispensation. CM skipped the date of the summons of CBI in the last leg of the year after the state High Court rejected his relief appeal.
As the new year is about to be ushered in the political mercury of the state is shooting up fast with a few days left for the Election Commission to announce the date of the Assembly election due in mid of February or early March.
Hell-bent on wresting power from Congress, BJP is going full throttle by back-to-back ferrying of formidable Union ministers to address rallies during its much-hyped Parivartan Yatra campaign. However, before that, something monumental happened that changed the face of politics of India with the PM announcing demonetization on November 8. The ruling party went the whole hog to intensify collective resentment against BJP to neutralise the anti-incumbency, plaguing the State.
Things slowly normalising on the demonetization aftermath, Narendra Modi literally took Dehradun by storm on December 27 as he addressed a huge rally after unveiling the Rs12,000 crore Char Dham road project. The PM making a metaphorical reference to the 2013 disaster relief scam through his cryptic comment on scooters guzzling 25 liters of fuel triggered important follow-ups as the CM ordered a judicial inquiry into the scam.
Meanwhile, Congress politics in the State has been witnessing dramatic twists and turns with the CM and the PCC president Kishore Upadhyay locking horns on many sensitive issues, forcing the high command to intervene to broker truce with the election inching closer.
In short, things unfolding for the new year are uncertain with much drama kept in store.