Raipur
Former Member of Parliament and tribal leader Nand Kumar Sai has joined the Congress on Monday in the presence of Chief Minister Bhupesh Baghel and Pradesh Congress Committee President Mohan Markam at Rajiv Bhawan in Raipur. Forest Minister Md Akbar, School Education Minister Dr Premsai Singh Tekam, Women and Child Development Minister Anila Bhendia, MLA Satyanarayan Sharma were present on the occasion.
Sai, who had broken his four-five decades long association with the BJP on Sunday evening, joined the Congress on Monday.
Welcoming Sai in the party fold, Baghel said, Nand Kumar Sai’s life is full of simplicity. Sai eats grains but do not eat salt and he struggled throughout the life to serve the tribals being a tribal leader of the state.
Baghel said, talks about Sai joining the Congress were already going on much before. But last night Nand Kumar Sai made up his mind to join the Congress, and sent the letter to Kumari Selja, the in-charge of Chhattisgarh Congress, who forwarded the letter to the party high command Mallikarjun Kharge who gave a green signal.
A three-time Lok Sabha MP and three-time MLA, Sai has been the state president of the party in both Chhattisgarh and undivided Madhya Pradesh.
A three-time Lok Sabha MP and three-time MLA, Sai has been the state president of the party in both Chhattisgarh and undivided Madhya Pradesh.
Sai told media that the decision was difficult. “I and my family members have been in BJP since the time of Jan Sangh. I had been serving the BJP with people like Atal Bihari Vajpayee and LK Advani and I used to follow the ideologies of Vajpayee,” said Sai.
That BJP is no longer in that form, he said. Circumstances have changed. Chhattisgarh had small villages and towns. “I have studied the work of Bhupesh Sarkar. Small villages and towns have turned cities,” he said.
CM Bhupesh Baghel has given it a new look. Narva, Garva, Ghurva, Bari scheme has proved effective for the public, he said.
Congress is doing good work under the leadership of Bhupesh Baghel, he said.
Senior BJP leader Vishnu Deo Sai Sai and Organization General Secretary Pawan Sai and some other leaders reached the residence of Sai and tried to meet him. But they were informed that Sai was is in Delhi. When asked to contact him by phone, there was no response.
In his resignation letter to Arun Sao, the state president of BJP, Nand Kumar Sai said that allegations are being leveled against him to malign his image and that too by his rivalries in the BJP. “My dignity is constantly being hurt, due to which I am in pain and therefore I urge to accept my resignation” Sai had written to Sao
Sai, a prominent tribal face of the BJP and hailing from northern Chhattisgarh, was first elected as a Janata Party MLA in 1977 from the Tapkara seat (now in Jashpur district) in Madhya Pradesh. In 1980, he was elected chief of the Raigad district unit of the BJP. And in 1985 BJP MLA was elected from Tapkara.
Elected as Lok Sabha member from Raigad in 1989, 1996 and 2004, and was made Rajya Sabha member in 2009 and 2010. Sai was Chhattisgarh BJP President from 2003-05 and Madhya Pradesh BJP chief from 1997 to 2000. He became the first Leader of the Opposition in the Chhattisgarh Legislative Assembly in November 2000 after the state of Chhattisgarh was carved out of Madhya Pradesh. In 2017, he became the chairman of the National Commission for Scheduled Tribes (NCST).
