Mumbai: North Indian unit office bearer quits BJP, joins Eknath Shinde Sena

Yadav with Chief Minister Eknath Shinde

The Bharatiya Janata Party's (BJP) North Indian unit office bearer, Ramprakash Yadav, joined Balasahebanchi Shiv Sena on Tuesday. Yadav will fight the civic election from Dahisar. According to a source, Yadav was unhappy with the local BJP leader. Yadav said, ‘'I have been working for the BJP for 15 years. The BJP and Balasahebanchi Shiv Sena will fight the BMC election together. Both parties have the same ideology."

"Yadav will contest the election from Ward number 1 of Dahisar. In the 2017 election, Tejaswi Ghosalkar of the Shiv Sena was elected from the ward. Therefore there is a possibility that the Shinde Sena will contest the next election from this ward," said a source from the Shinde Sena.

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In 2017 Yadav's wife Rekha contested the election independently from ward number 1. She stood second with 3,098 votes. Ghosalkar won with 4,913 votes. The BJP candidate secured 2,584 votes in this election. It is learnt that Yadav had demanded candidature for his wife from the BJP for the civic polls this time, but the party rejected his request as the local leadership is unhappy with him.

"If a person wants to join our party. We will welcome him. Our party and BJP are in an alliance so we take decisions after discussing with each other. This will not affect the relationship between the parties," said Shital Mhatre, spokesperson of the Shinde Sena on Yadav joining them. Tejaswi Ghosalkar is the daughter-in-law of former MLA Vinod Ghosalkar. He is a loyalist of former Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray.