Rajasthan: Rebel MLA quits BJP, floats new party

Rebel BJP MLA and former state minister Ghanshyam Tiwari resigned from Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and announced new party on Monday. Ghanshyam Tiwari's son Akhilesh has founded a political outfit named 'Bharat Vahini Party' to contest the Assembly polls in Rajasthan.

The party will work with an aim to contest the election on all 200 Assembly seats under the leadership of Ghanshyam Tiwari, founder and president of the party Akhilesh Tiwari said.

The party is going to organise its first state meeting of leaders and workers in Jaipur on July 3, he said, adding that 2,000 workers will take part in the meeting.

Ghanshyam Tiwari hails from Jaipur district. He held the position of Deputy Leader of Opposition in 13th Rajasthan assembly and currently he is sitting MLA from Sanganer Assembly constituency. He won his first Rajasthan Assembly election from Sikar in 1980 and again in 1985. In the 1993 Assembly election, he was elected from Chomu Constituency and since 2003 he won consecutively 3 times from Sanganer Assembly constituency. In 2013 assembly election, Ghanshyam Tiwari won by 65350 votes, the highest margin in Rajasthan.

He was served show cause notices in 2017 by the party's national discipline committee. The notices were sent after he alleged that the BJP in Rajasthan had become "a place for mafias and sycophants while dedicated, loyal and qualified people had been sidelined".

(With PTI inputs)