Kamal Nath (ANI/Twitter)

NEW DELHI: The Kamal Nath-led Congress government in Madhya Pradesh suffered a setback on Thursday as one party MLA announced his resignation from the state assembly. Congress MLA Hardeep Singh Dang sent his resignation letter to assembly speaker Narmada Prasad Prajapati on Thursday night.

Dang is one of the several Congress MLAs who had gone "missing" over the last few days. The Congress has accused the BJP of holding these MLAs hostage. The BJP, however, denied the charge that it was trying to poach Congress MLAs in a bid to bring down the state government.

The MLA claimed that though he had been elected for second time from Suwasra in Mandsaur, no minister or officials were listening to him and that is why he had resigned.

Six of the Congress MLAs returned on Wednesday following which state Congress spokesperson Shobha Oza said that "operation Kamal (actions of chief minister Kamal Nath ) had triumphed over operation lotus (the alleged attempt by the BJP, whose symbol is lotus, to topple the government)."

Legislators of the Bahujan Samaj Party and Samajwadi Party, who were brought back by a special plane by Congress leaders to Bhopal, denied charges of horse-trading and abduction by BJP leaders in Madhya Pradesh.

While reiterating their support to the Congress-led Kamal Nath government, BSP MLAs Ram Bai and Sanjeev Singh Kushwaha and SP legislator Rajesh Shukla denied that any BJP leader contacted them and offered a deal.

However, Dang was among the four who had not returned to Bhopal.

The other 3 MLAs - Raghuraj Kansana, Bishulal Singh of the Congress and independent MLA Surendra Singh Shera - are still missing.

The 230-member Madhya Pradesh assembly has 114 Congress MLAs followed by the BJP which has 107 members.

The mark for simple majority is 116. Four independents, two MLAs of the BSP and one of the SP provide crucial support to the Congress government.

Two seats are vacant following the deaths of a Congress and a BJP legislator.

