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Ahead of the Gujarat election, the BJP suffered a setback on Friday as Nana Patole, a senior party leader from Maharashtra and Lok Sabha MP, resigned both from the party and the Lower House, protesting the “authoritarian” style of functioning of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
Despite reaching out to the PM on farmer issues, the party and the Centre did not do anything, he said here.
His resignation letter to Lok Sabha Speaker Sumitra Mahajan listed 14 issues where the BJP-led government has allegedly failed.
Patole has been attacking the BJP leadership of late. There are indications that he was irked by the growing proximity of a section of BJP leaders with the NCP. He had defeated NCP strongman Praful Patel in the 2014 elections.
Patole had resigned from the Congress to join the BJP ahead of the Lok Sabha polls. He was a member of the Maharashtra Assembly for three terms before that.
“The objectives with which I had joined the (BJP) party have been belied, but now I am free of the turmoil in my mind,” Patole told reporters after submitting his resignation.
However, he did not reveal his future plans but said he is in discussion with “some like-minded” parties.
To join Rahul rallyAccording to a PTI report, he plans to join Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi at a rally in Ahmedabad on December 11.
Patole met AICC in charge of Maharashtra Mohan Prakash after the resignation. “He is an old colleague from the party,” said Prakash. “He has been raising the issues Rahul ji (Congress vice-president) and our party have been raising. He did so by staying within the ruling party.”
Though the BJP had promised to implement the MS Swaminathan committee report that recommended better remuneration for farm produces, it did not fulfil it when it came to power, said Patole.
“I have raised these issues in the Lok Sabha and flagged them whenever I met the Prime Minister and the State’s Chief Minister. When I highlighted them at a meeting at the Prime Minister’s residence, his response was not something expected in a democracy,” he said.
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