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Is it end of road for Shibu Soren?
Tomorrow, the JMM chief will find out whether he could keep his dream job in Jharkhand or should return to Delhi.
Jharkhand Chief Minister Shibu Soren will soon find out whether he gets to keep his dream job or returns looking for his old job in New Delhi.
Or he could also remain suspended in a nowhere zone in between, since the Congress party does not have any stake in him, now that the Jharkhand elections are over.
Soren, 61, who has been in and out of the Union Cabinet ever since the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance (UPA) came to power in May, could well be headed out of Jharkhand with the odds stacked against him ahead of Friday's trust vote.
He hurriedly quit as Coal Minister, apparently sending a fax message from a post office, before being sworn in Chief Minister March 2.
Even his Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM) has little hope of swinging the test of strength in the 81-member assembly, which began its session Thursday, with the rival National Democratic Alliance (NDA) boasting of 41 MLAs on its side and keeping them under 24-hour watch.
"There is very little doubt that Soren will lose power," admitted a JMM leader.
Soren claims he has 40 legislators on his side but even that number is being doubted. A bid to nominate an Anglo Indian member to shore up the UPA tally has failed as the Supreme Court on Wednesday scuttled the move and ordered the trust vote advanced from March 15, the deadline announced by Governor Syed Sibtey Razi.
In addition to losing a post he had coveted ever since the birth of Jharkhand in 2000, the JMM chief faces an uncertain future after Friday.
Though he expects to be taken back into the Union Cabinet and sworn in for the third time, his comeback will be tougher this time. There are no state elections in the offing and the Congress has already taken much embarrassment on his account.
Said a Congress leader: "It is too early to talk about the future."
Though sources say the government would wait for the ongoing budget session to get over in May before doing anything about Soren, Congress leaders say the UPA coalition will not fall apart even if the five JMM MPs, Soren included, walk out.
Soren, first sworn in the central ministry in May, quit in August after a court revived a 1975 mass killing case embarrassing the UPA government.
He made history as the only union minister to become the object of a massive manhunt before he turned himself in. After he secured bail, he was taken back into the cabinet in November.
