Jharkhand Chief Minister Hemant Soren, who is facing imminent arrest in a land scam case, convened a meeting of legislators from the State’s ruling coalition parties at his official residence in Ranchi on January 3. Emerging from the two-hour-long meeting, at which the current political situation in the State was discussed, MLAs insisted that the CM would not resign.
Of the 38 MLAs in attendance, 23 were from Mr. Soren’s Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM), 14 from the Congress, and one from the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD). Other ruling party MLAs failed to attend due to personal and family reasons.
The meeting was called against the backdrop of the Enforcement Directorate’s (ED) probe of the alleged land scam, in which it has issued seven summons which Mr. Soren has ignored. The last such summons was issued on December 30, 2023, in which the ED gave the CM a last chance to record his statement in the case, and asked him to state a place and time to do so.
