Denied ticket, aspirant carts away chairs

aurangabad (Maharashtra) — If no Lok Sabha seat, then office chairs are fine.

That seemed to be logic for Aurangabad Congress MLA from Sillod, Abdul Sattar A. Nabi, who was denied a nomination for the Aurangabad parliamentary constituency.

In a huff, Sattar and his supporters on Monday carted off 300 plastic chairs from the local party office and he later announced his resignation from the Congress.

An aide confirmed the developments and justified it on grounds that Sattar had paid for those chairs a few years ago and hence they belonged to him.

Since he had quit the party, there was no point leaving his chairs behind which he would need again. So they were shifted to his private office, the aide said.

At a joint meeting held on Monday at the NCP office here, the Congress decided to field a Legislative Council Member Subhash Zhambad, amid protests by a fuming Sattar who later announced his

decision to quit. Shortly after submitting his resignation, he sparked speculation of moving to the Bharatiya Janata Party by calling on Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis, but clarified it was to thank him for his cooperation during his four-year tenure as a Sillod MLA.

Later, he also met Congress leaders who are now toying with the idea of giving Sattar the Aurangabad nomination.

“Whether Sattar contests on Congress ticket or as an independent, or with some other party, will be decided by our workers at a meeting scheduled here on March 29,” his aide said.