Wednesday, December 11, 2024
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Mukul rules out joining BJP

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Speculation rife over more Cong defections

By C K Nayak

SHILLONG: Opposition Congress leader Mukul Sangma has dismissed reports in a section of the media that he along with his entire family are joining BJP.
When contacted by The Shillong Times on phone Mukul said that such rumour mongers should revisit the political history of Congress in Meghalaya. 
Sangma’s wife Dikkanchi D Shira, brother Zenith M Sangma and daughter Miani  Dalbot Shira are other Congress MLAs in Meghalaya.
“I did not leave the party even when late Purno A Sangma left the Congress to form the NCP long ago,” he quipped.
In his tweet, Mukul said,” All nonsense! I am asking Cyber Crime Cell of Meghalaya Police to investigate and track the source of this misinformation with criminal , malafide and defamatory intent.
The former Meghalaya Chief Minister, who held a record seven years in office, is currently in New Delhi along with other top Congress leaders to attend the CWC meeting.
Reports about the senior Congress leader from Garo Hills joining the BJP began to surface after a shock defection by another senior Congress leader from neighbouring Assam.
The Congress’s chief whip in the Rajya Sabha, Bhubaneswar Kalita, shocked the grand old party by resigning from the Rajya Sabha, this week.
There is also speculation about former Education Minister Ampareen Lyngdoh joining the BJP.
She failed to attend Congress party meetings in New Delhi despite invitations and had also resigned from the post of AICC secretary in- charge of Mizoram. 
Incidentally, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had launched the party’s 
membership drive on July 6 from Varanasi. The campaign turned out to be a major success for the BJP with the recruitment number going up by over 60 per cent. The BJP is expecting to touch the 20 crore membership by August 20.
The former Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan, who has been tasked since last week of July, with supervising the drive in the Northeastern states, is said to have reached out to a number of senior Congress leaders taking advantage of the reported “disillusionment” against their high command amid reports about some of them contemplating to leave the grand-old party.
Former Assam Minister Gautam Roy and ex-Rajya Sabha member Santiuse Kujur on Saturday resigned from Congress to join the BJP. Reports further claim that both Mukul and former union minister Pawan Singh Ghatowar are also in touch with the top BJP leadership, something flatly denied by Mukul.
Sources indicate that the former union minister may join the BJP along with his wife Jibontara Ghatowar.
At the same time, more reports are surfacing about two more Congress
 leaders – former minister Bharat Narah and current Rajya Sabha member Ranee Narah – contemplating to switch over to the BJP.
Meanwhile, the Congress’s top decision-making body met in Delhi on 
Saturday for the second time amid crisis over leadership but failed to find any acceptable solution.
The party’s top brass, including former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, earlier went into a huddle at the party headquarters in Delhi to find a solution to the leadership crisis triggered by Rahul Gandhi’s resignation following the Lok Sabha polls debacle but in vain.

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