In a setback to the NCP, a senior party leader from Thane district and current chairman of the District Co-operative bank Kapil Patil on Tuesday resigned from the Sharad Pawar-led party and joined the BJP.
Patil was inducted into the BJP in the presence of the party’s senior leader Gopinath Munde, leader of Opposition in the Maharashtra legislative Assembly Eknath Khadse, his counterpart in the Council Vinod Tawde and State BJP chief Devendra Fadnavis.
Party sources said that the BJP would field Patil as its candidate from the communally sensitive constituency of Bhiwandi in neighbouring Thane district Patil will take on Congress’ Vishwanath Patil in the lok Sabha poll.
Talking to the media, after he joined the BJP, Patil said he had decided to to join the BJP, after he realised that the development of Bhiwandi was possible only under the prime ministership of Modi.
Vishwanath Patil, it may be recalled, had resigned from the BJP and set up Kunbi Sena, after he was denied party ticket to contest the 2009 lok Sabha polls. He continues to be the founder-president of the Kunbi Sena, a party that represents politically-influential Kunbi community in Thane district.
“There is Modi wave in the country and I feel that the development of Bhiwandi is possible only by riding this wave. Hence I have decided to join the BJP. I have nothing against anyone. I have no complaints. I want the overall development of Bhiwandi and have full faith in the leadership of Narendra Modi,” Kapil Patil said.
In another poll-related development, retired Additional Director General of Police (Special Operations) Prem Kumar Jain joined the Ramdas Athavale-headed Republican Party of India (A) in the afternoon.
Jain, who joined the RPI (A) less than a month after he resigned from his post and sought voluntary retirement from the Indian Police Service (IPS), said that he had decided to a join a political party “to send a message across so the Congress-led DF government” which had meted out a “raw deal” to senior IPS officers who had returned to Maharashtra after having been on a Central deputation.
“After having been in IPS for 33 years, I resigned from my post to join main stream politics not as a protest, but to send a message to the state government, which has meted out raw deal to treatment to IPS officers like us,” he said.
“Senior officers who were earlier on central deputation are kept waiting for months and after all the waiting and are finally handed insignificant postings. These are officers who have a very good reputation and have served with high-profile government agencies. It is sad the senior officers are treated like this,” Jain said.
A 1981-batch officer, Jain had resigned from the IPS on February 22 in the wake of a controversy in the State IPS circles over the recent “out-of-turn” appointment of Rakesh Maria as the Mumbai Police Commissioner in place of Singh.
The DF government had appointed Maria, a 1981-batch officer, as the Mumbai CP after ignoring the seniority of at least three IPS officers.Jain, who earlier lobbied for a BJP ticket to contest the lok Sabha polls from Punjab, remained tight-lipped as to why he had been denied RPI(A) ticket to contest the lok Sabha polls.
Athavale, in whose presence that Jain announced his decision to join the RPI(A), said: “He (Jain) is not interested in contesting the lok Sabha polls. But he has shown interest in contesting for the State Assembly elections to be held later this year. We will consider his request during the Assembly polls”.