Inclusion of Shailendra and Abha upsets workers
Jamshedpur: The alleged �political rivalry� between former Chief Minister Arjun Munda and his so-called �arch opponent within state BJP� and former Deputy Chief Minister Raghuvar Das today seemingly came to fore here during a party workers meeting at Town Hall in Sidhgora.
The workers from East Assembly BJP protested inclusion of former JMM MP Shailendra Mahato along with his wife Abha Mahato, who rejoined BJP.
The duo received primary membership of the saffron party at a simple function organised recently at Sakchi office. The party workers boycotted the meeting and came out raising slogans.
State BJP president Ravindra Rai, Munda along with former state BJP president Dr. Dineshnand Goswami, former MP couple Shailendra and Abha Mahato, who had returned to the party fold recently, were present on the occasion.
Former JMM leader and former Jamshedpur MP Shailendra Mahato, resigned from the BJP stating that the party had betrayed him by not nominating as a candidate in the Jamshedpur parliamentary by-elections in 2007. His wife Abha Mahto, a two-term BJP MP from Jamshedpur, had also resigned from the party.
Though talk are doing around the couple has joined the party with a hope to bag party ticket but Mahato, who won MP elections in 1989 and 1991, claimed: � We have joined the party without any hidden desire. We both just want to serve the party�.
Mahato joined BJP on January 7, 1996 after snapping ties with Jharkhand Mukti Morcha following the MP bribery case, of which he was one of the accused. Now he is gearing up to start new innings.
Sources also informed that the party workers from Jmashedpur West Assembly area protested charges of corruption against the district BJP president Rajkumar Srivastava. They said that the president must be removed till he is not proved innocence.