3 NCP, 1 Cong MLAS resign in Maharashtra

AHEAD OF THE STATE POLLS , FOUR MLAS SUBMITTED THEIR RESIGNATIONS TO THE SPEAKER. THEY ARE EXPECTED TO JOIN BJP

MUMBAI: Four Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) and Congress lawmakers resigned on Tuesday ahead of their expected induction into the ruling Bhartiya Janata Party in Maharashtra a day later.

Sandeep Naik, Vaibhav Pichad, Shivendrasinh Bhonsle (NCP) and Kalidas Kolambkar (Congress) submitted their resignations to Maharashtra assembly speaker Haribhau Bagade.

Five legislators have left the NCP over the last two months. Two of them, Jaydutt Kshirsagar and Pandurang Barora, have joined the Shiv Sena. NCP’S Mumbai president Sachin Ahir, too, left the NCP and joined the Shiv Sena last week.

“We do not want to hurt NCP chief Sharad Pawar. But people are of the view that the NCP is not coming back to power without which development of my constituency is impossible,” said Pichad.

Naik said everyone in his constituency views chief minister Devendra Fadnavis as pro-development. “My family allowed me to take the political decision of my choice. My father [NCP leader Ganesh Naik] and brother [Sanjeev Naik] will take their own decisions,” Naik said. Sanjeev Naik is a former Thane Lok Sabha member.

Kolambkar sent his resignation from the Congress’s primary membership to state party president Balasaheb Thorat on Monday after announcing his decision to join the BJP.

The seven-term lawmaker is known as a close aide to former chief minister Narayan Rane.

He was one of the lawmakers, who left Shiv Sena along with Rane and joined the Congress in 2006.

Maharashtra minister Girish Mahajan said the Congress and NCP leaders have no trust in their leadership. “Around 50 lawmakers from both the parties [Congress and NCP] want to join the BJP...”

In 2014, the Congress and NCP won 42 and 41 out of Maharashtra 288 assembly seats.