Ex-BJP MLA Joins Congress Ahead of MP for Fanfare Polls


Sagar’s former BJP MLA in Madhya Pradesh’s Bundelkhand region, Parul Sahu (39), joined Congress on Friday, shooting him in the arm before crucial elections for 28 assembly seats scheduled to be held with the Bihar state assembly elections in late November, as recently announced by the Election Commission of India (ECI).

Sahu, the daughter of a business magnate in the Sagar district, announced her incorporation into Congress in the presence of the president of the state Congress Kamal Nath and a horde of other party leaders and workers at the headquarters of the state Congress.

“The people of the Surkhi assembly constituency (in Sagar district) want me to be their voice and fight against (an atmosphere of) arrogance and fear in the constituency,” Parul Sahu said in his short speech.

The Speaker of the State Congress, Kamal Nath, said: “The by-elections are not intended only for certain constituencies of the assembly, but the whole state is looking at these by-elections as they will show how the people give an appropriate response to manipulation policy practiced by the BJP “.

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Parul Sahu represented the Surkhi assembly constituency as the BJP MLA from 2013 to 2018. She had won the seat against Congressional candidate and now Transport and Revenue Minister Govind Singh Rajput (59) by a narrow margin of 141 votes in the 2013 assembly elections. The BJP denied him a ticket in the 2018 assembly elections.

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The Rajput, who was fighting for Congress, had defeated BJP candidate Sudhir Yadav by 21,518 votes in the 2018 assembly elections and became the Minister of Transportation and Revenue in the then cabinet of Kamal Nath. He was one of 22 MLAs in Congress who resigned from the state assembly in March this year in an act of rebellion against then-Chief Minister Kamal Nath. They later joined the BJP.

BJP State Spokesperson Rajneesh Agrawal said: “Parul Sahu’s decision to join Congress is not surprising. He was in contact with Congress for a long time. However, it will not affect the outlook for the BJP in preliminary polls. “

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