SHILLONG, July 27: It was a bombshell for Health Minister, AL Hek to learn about being dropped from the cabinet.
Till late in the afternoon of Tuesday and shortly before the swearing-in ceremony at Raj Bhavan, the senior cabinet minister had no inkling about the impending fall of axe on him.
When The Shillong Times contacted him shortly after 4 pm to ask if he was at the swearing-in ceremony, surprisingly Hek said he was never informed about being dropped from the cabinet and that he was being replaced by Shullai.
Considering that Hek had spent nearly a week in Delhi with BJP higher ups and was at the dinner with Home Minister Amit Shah at Raj Bhavan on Saturday, it is curious that he was kept in the dark about this major political decision.
Similarly, when Sanbor Shullai was contacted at 11.30 am, he too said he had not been informed about being sworn in as minister either by his party or by the Governor’s Secretariat – this when the media was already informed about the swearing ceremony scheduled for 4 pm.
Sources said that Chief Minister Conrad Sangma, who must have been kept in the loop by the decision makers in BJP, also did not inform Hek about the change.
Observers say that Hek’s public reaction to the Saubhagya scam that “there cannot be any smoke without fire”, did not go well with the chief minister. He apparently read the statement as Hek’s lack of “loyalty” to the coalition, particularly at a time when the ruling MDA is battling it out on many fronts.
Observers say that Sanbor, who refused to fall in line with BJP president Ernest Mawrie’s tirade against NPP over alleged embezzlement of funds in GHADC and stood by NPP as a rock, has got the ultimate prize for his personal loyalty to Conrad Sangma.
