AGARTALA, Dec 10 - The �referendum� rally called by Tripura Chief Minister Biplab Kumar Deb on December 13 has been called off �following a request by party MLAs and workers�, said Deputy Chief Minister Jishnu Dev Varma.
Upset by sloganeering against him by supporters of dissident MLAs in the State Guest House recently, Deb had dramatically announced that he would seek a �referendum� on whether he should continue in office at a public rally. Loyalist MLAs and ministerial colleagues had since been trying to persuade him to call off the �referendum� rally.
Several senior ministers including the Deputy Chief Minister, MLAs and other party leaders called on the Chief Minister at his official residence last night and requested him to cancel the rally. Deb is understood to called off the rally in the wake of their plea.
Deputy Chief Minister Dev Varma today told media persons that the proposed rally has been cancelled by the Chief Minister. �There is no threat to the Government,� he reiterated.
On whether anyone would be held accountable for the �unsavoury episode� at the State Guest House, the Deputy Chief Minister said that the matter would be decided by the party leadership.
Dev Varma said that the State BJP leaders spoke to the party chief JP Nadda and Tripura prabhari Vinod Kumar Sonkar last night who asked them to persuade the Chief Minister to withdraw the proposed rally.
The Deputy Chief Minister, however, refused to mention how many ministers and MLAs met Deb last night. However, sources claimed that 24 ministers and MLAs out of the 36 party legislators attended the meeting, while all the dissident MLAs skipped it. Twelve MLAs did not turn up to express solidarity with the beleaguered Chief Minister, the sources pointed out.
In the 60-member Tripura Assembly, the BJP has 36 MLAs, while ally IPFT has eight MLAs. The rest of the MLAs belong to the Opposition CPI (M).
Meanwhile, political analysts claim that the fate of the Biplab Kumar Deb Government also hinges on the mood of the IPFT which has been demanding at least 22 seats in the election to the 28-member Tripura Tribal Areas Autonomous District Council.