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Shillong, June 21: Meghalaya Speaker Charles Pyngrope today accepted the resignation tendered by Tura legislator Purno A. Sangma as a member of the 60-member House.
Speaking to this correspondent, Pyngrope said, “I received a faxed letter of Sangma’s resignation today around 2pm in my office.
The resignation has been accepted, and I have also conveyed the same to Sangma and also to the Election Commission.”
However, according to Section 151A of the Representation of the People Act, 1951, byelection for filling any vacancy shall be held within a period of six months from the date of the occurrence of the vacancy.
A provisio under the section of the act states such an election will not be held if the remainder of the term of a member in relation to a vacancy is less than one year.
The term of the current Assembly ends in March next year.
Hence, the byelection for the Tura Assembly seat would not be held in view of the provisio of the said act.
Sangma was elected from Tura constituency in the 2008 polls on an NCP ticket, where he defeated six other candidates. While the former Lok Sabha Speaker polled 10,881 votes, his nearest rival, Billykid Sangma, an Independent candidate, garnered 8,056 votes.
The first time that Sangma made a foray into state politics was in the 1988 Assembly polls when he was a Congress stalwart.
Sangma polled 7,003 votes while his nearest rival, Lamberth Sangma of the APHLC polled 5,494 votes.
In 1988, Sangma also became chief minister for the first time. However, he couldn’t complete a full five- year term.
While his tenure as a legislator was supposed to conclude in 1993, Sangma resigned in 1991 to contest in the Lok Sabha elections.
This time, too, the veteran leader will not be able to complete his full tenure, as he gears up for the race to Raisina Hill.
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