GUWAHATI, March 11: Denied tickets by the party for the ensuing Assembly elections, BJP MLAs and senior party leaders, Shiladitya Dev (Hojai) and Dilip Kumar Paul (Silchar) have resigned from the saffron party.
The party has instead nominated Ramakrishna Ghosh for Hojai constituency and Dipayan Chakraborty for the key Silchar Assembly seat.
The outspoken Dev, who has been with the BJP for 30 years, minced no words yet again to express his disappointment, while alleging that “a big conspiracy was hatched against him long back to deny him a ticket and that his firm push for Hindutva had a bearing on the party’s decision.”
Unable to come to terms with the party’s decision, several supporters of Dev in Hojai went on a rampage, shouting slogans against the party leadership and destroying poll campaign posters of the BJP leaders.
Meanwhile, expressing resentment over the snub, Silchar MLA Paul announced that he would contest the April 1 poll as an Independent candidate.
Addressing a media conference in Silchar on Wednesday evening, Paul said he had been associated with the BJP since 1983 and that he never imagined that the party, for which he worked tirelessly for over three decades, would deny him a ticket. “I am deeply hurt. The treatment I received was not expected,” he said.
Paul alleged that the BJP leadership did not give him a ticket “to save the syndicates/rackets that facilitate illegal transportation of coal, fertilisers, betel nuts and stones in Barak Valley.”
He also claimed that drugs and arms were also smuggled to the valley.
“I had raised my voice from time to time against syndicates carrying out clandestine activities in Barak Valley,” he said, while hinting at what might have prompted the party’s decision.