MP: Congress fires ‘toothless tiger’ jibe at Shivraj over portfolio saga

Chouhan has missed self-announced deadlines for portfolio allocation at least twice

digvijaya singh shivraj A collage of Digvijaya Singh (left) and MP CM Shivraj Singh Chouhan | Official Facebook accounts

With the portfolio allocation to newly appointed ministers in Madhya Pradesh hanging fire even eight days after the cabinet expansion, the opposition Congress has sharpened its attack on the BJP government and Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan.

Chouhan, who has missed self-announced deadlines for portfolio allocation at least twice now, is scheduled to visit bypoll-bound Morena on Saturday to have dialogue with street vendors and there is no indication in his schedule that departments might be distributed among ministers even on Saturday.

Chouhan, during a visit to Delhi on July 5 where he met senior party functionaries and Home Minister Amit Shah apparently to discuss portfolio allocation, had said that the allocations will be done once he was back in Bhopal on July 6. But his return was deferred to July 7, and on July 8, he indicated that the portfolio allocation will come before the scheduled first meeting of the expanded cabinet on morning of July 9.

But the meeting was rescheduled later to July 9 evening and in the backdrop of surrender by Uttar Pradesh fugitive Vikas Dubey at Ujjain on that day, the meeting was finally cancelled. There has been no word on the allocations since.

Late on Friday night, Rajya Sabha member and ex-chief minister Digvijaya Singh took a fresh jibe at the situation and Chouhan. He tweeted “Its eight days since cabinet expansion. The workout by the chief minister for portfolio allocation is simply not concluding. Has the tiger become toothless, clawless and destitute? Let’s see who runs away giving up territory.”

The jibe comes in the backdrop that after Chouhan, Jyotiraditya Scindia had also termed himself a tiger borrowing Chouhan’s phrase tiger abhi zinda hai (tiger is still alive) after the cabinet expansion on July 2.

Digvijaya’s tweet was a follow-up to another that he posted on Thursday when he said that the entire BJP from Delhi to Bhopal was working out on portfolio allocation. “This is not a fight for departments but for distribution of loot. Scindia ji will not want to leave transport, excise, revenue and urban administration,” Digvijaya had tweeted.

Meanwhile, ex-minister and chairperson of the media cell of MP Congress, Jitu Patwari said at a press conference that Shivraj Singh Chouhan has proven to be a weak chief minister who is running the government on an ‘outsource’ basis. He said that if Chouhan is not able to allocate portfolios by Friday night, he should resign from his post. Patwari has also demanded early holding of elections in the state so that a government properly elected by people could take over.