Rajasthan Crisis: Ashok Gehlot meets Governor seeking assembly session

New Delhi, July 24: Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot's met the state Governor Kalraj Mishra, seeking the next state assembly session to be convened, after Rajasthan High Court gave a reprieve to the Sachin Pilot camp.

Congress MLAs, loyal to Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot are reportedly raising slogans of 'Ashok Gehlot Zindabad' inside the Raj Bhavan premises.

Gehlot's camp claims that he has at least 103 MLAs loyal to him - 88 from the Congress, 2 from the BTP and CPM each, 1 from RLD and 10 independents.

Earlier in the day, Gehlot alleged the governor was under pressure to not call an Assembly session.

All constitutional and legal options are open before the state government and will be resorted to "as and when necessary", the chief minister told PTI as uncertainty persists over the future of his government following a rebellion by his now sacked deputy Sachin Pilot.

"I want to repeat that we have a majority of the MLAs and even our adversaries know this. We will never shy away from resorting to democratic and constitutional processes in this regard and will take decisions at the right time," Gehlot said to a question on when he will call an assembly session.

The chief minister sounded dismissive of Pilot and purported attempts to bring him back to the Congress fold, saying the party leadership had been anguished by his anti-Congress activities.

Rajasthan High Court ordered maintaining status quo on the disqualification notices sent by the Speaker to Sachin Pilot and 18 other dissident MLAs.

The Pilot camp had moved the high court against the notices under which they face possible disqualification from the state assembly.

The high court on Friday also admitted a petition filed by the 19 dissident Congress MLAs to include the Union government in the list of respondents to their petition.