Jharkhand chief minister Arjun Munda will seek a trust vote on Tuesday at a makeshift Assembly instead of the Assembly building, whose current state of disrepair due to an unusually prolonged renovation work is an instant metaphor for the misgovernance Jharkhand is known for. The Sri Krishna Institute of Public Administration (SKIPA)
in Ranchi would be the venue where a special session of the Assembly would be held on Saturday for Mr Munda’s floor test and the Assembly secretariat would be housed because renovation work continuing in the Assembly building for the past five months is yet to be over.
Mr Munda, who was sworn in as the 10-year-old state’s eighth chief minister on Saturday, will be the second chief minister in Jharkhand to seek a trust vote outside the state Assembly. His predecessor Sibu Soren had faced the trust vote at the SKIPA in December last year. A tender worth Rs 2.3 crores for renovation work of the Assembly building was cleared in October 2009 by the state building construction department in clear violation of the stipulated rules. The department, known for often getting construction work done without tenders, had cleared the tender for the renovation of the Assembly building without approving the design and technical details, which were finally approved only in August, said sources.
As per the conditions of the tender, the renovation work had to be completed in 40 days. But work started in April 2010, six months after the tender was cleared to Godrej, ostensibly because the 2009 Assembly polls in Jharkhand were announced soon after and the model code of conduct came in place.