With ‘no other option’, winner returns to BJP

It was December 2000, two months after the state of Chhattisgarh was born. The brass of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in the state trooped in anger to the official residence of then Chief Minister Ajit Jogi in Raipur. They were bent on stopping a major political upheaval.

Jogi was trying to convince a BJP legislator to vacate his seat for him. By doing so, he could manage to reduce a seat of the BJP without disturbing his party’s tally. The BJP leaders, including current Chief Minister Raman Singh and former minister and Raipur MP Ramesh Bais, sat on a dharna outside the chief minister’s house. But by then, a senior police officer with escorts had sneaked into the chief minister’s bungalow with the legislator. The man for whom the top BJP guns were sitting on the road was Ramdayal Uike, who has again hogged the headlines by leaving the Congress.

Uike then quit as Marwahi legislator to facilitate Jogi contesting the byelection from the constituency.

Though the BJP then failed to upset Jogi’s strategy, it has hit back after nearly 18 years. Last week, Uike rejoined the BJP. Though he was known more to be a staunch supporter of Jogi, who is no more with the Congress, the development had come as a big jolt for the opposition. For, Uike was working president of the Chhattisgarh Pradesh Congress Committee. But the tribal leader was left with no other option but to return to the saffron fold.

“Uike was feeling suffocated in the Congress,” Singh said, while welcoming him to the party.

True, Uike was never recognised in the Congress and was never “rewarded”. He was dropped from the Congress screening committee for polls and was not allowed to share dais with Congress chief Rahul Gandhi during his recent visit.

Singh said the BJP would gain strength with Uike joining. The party could now expect to get the Tanakhar assembly seat, which Uike represents. The seat, reserved for the Scheduled Tribes (ST), had become Uike’s bastion and BJP managers were treating it as a negative one. Uike has been winning there since 2003 by a huge margin.

While it was difficult to take on Uike in Tanakhar, his candidature on the Congress ticket was uncertain. The party was in talks with the Gondwana Ganatantra Party (GGP). If an alliance was reached, the Congress would have given the seat to GGP chief Hirasingh Markam to contest from.

While the leader of the opposition, T S Singhdeo, termed the development surprising, Congress President Bhupesh Baghel came up with a banter: The party on whose ticket Uike becomes legislator loses.

Before returning to the BJP, Uike was the working president of the Congress in Chhattisgarh. Still his candidature on the Congress ticket appeared uncertain