Former MLA Prafulla Majhi joins BJD
Former MLA Prafulla Majhi joins BJD
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Bhubaneswar: Prafulla Majhi, a former MLA who was kicked out of the Congress earlier this week, joined the BJD on Friday.
The BJD Rajya Sabha member Subash Singh's house in Unit-6 here hosted the party joining celebration. Majhi was welcomed to the Conch party by BJD organising secretary Pranab Prakash Das, MLAs Pratap Deo and Pritiranjan Ghadai, and others.
Majhi claimed he was forced to leave Congress because it is on the decline and does not provide its members with any independence. He congratulated BJD president and Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik, saying that joining the party would enable him to better serve tribals in his region.
Hundreds of Majhi's supporters, including his wife Tribeni, joined the BJD.
On Monday, the three-time former legislator was dismissed from Congress, a day after telling the media that he will join the ruling BJD in Bhubaneswar on December 10 in the presence of the party's president. He eventually resigned from the AICC, citing his feelings of being ignored and humiliated within the party, to in-charge president Sonia Gandhi.
Majhi began his political career in 2006, when he won a bye-election to the Talsara Assembly Constituency in Sundargarh district, succeeding his uncle-in-law Gajadhar Majhi. In the 2009 and 2014 elections, he was elected to the Odisha Assembly on the Congress platform.
In the 2019 Assembly elections, he was defeated by BJP candidate Bhabani Shankar Bhoi.
Majhi is the second Congress leader to switch to the Conch party ahead of the Panchayat votes, which are set to take place early next year.
Pradeep Majhi, a former Congress MP from Nabarangpur, joined the BJD on November 6, making him the third great old party leader from the undivided Koraput district to join the BJD. Chandrasekhar Majhi and Kailash Chandra Kulesika, both former MLAs, had previously joined the Naveen Patnaik-led party.
Thousands of members of Congress have also defected to BJD in recent months.
