Goa: Sena rebels to hold meeting to decide way ahead after Uddhav's resignation
Panaji(PTI): Rebel Shiv Sena MLAs led by senior leader Eknath Shinde, who are currently camping in Goa, will hold a meeting on Thursday to decide the way forward as they are likely to support the BJP to form the next government in Maharashtra following the resignation of Uddhav Thackeray as the chief minister.
A chartered flight carrying the breakaway MLAs landed at the Dabolim airport in Goa on Wednesday night from Guwahati. They are staying in a luxury hotel at Dona Paula.
"We will hold a meeting on Thursday to decide our future course of action," Deepak Kesarkar, the spokesperson of the rebel group, told a television channel.
He said the decision will be taken by Shinde after talks. Kesarkar said a decision on when to leave Goa for Mumbai is yet to be taken.
"Whether to leave on Thursday or Friday is yet to be decided," he said.
When asked about the Supreme Court verdict on Wednesday in which it refused to stay Maharashtra Governor B S Koshyari's direction to the Uddhav Thackeray-led government to take a floor test in the Assembly, Kesarkar said there was nothing to feel happy about it as the NCP and Congress made Sena people fight among themselves.
"We had tried to avoid it (rebellion) But it could not be avoided," he said.
Reacting to Thackeray's resignation, Kesarkar said that Sena MLAs had urged him to pull out of the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) even yesterday, but he preferred to approach the Supreme Court.
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Surat LS candidate Nilesh Kumbhani whose nomination form was rejected suspended from Congress
Ahmedabad, Apr 25: The Gujarat Congress on Friday suspended from the party for six years its Surat Lok Sabha candidate Nilesh Kumbhani, whose nomination form was rejected over discrepancies leading to the BJP's Mukesh Dalal getting elected unopposed.
A statement from the Congress said the party's disciplinary committee decided to suspend Kumbhani after thorough discussion, adding it had come to the conclusion that the nomination form was rejected due to gross negligence on his part or "in connivance with the BJP".
"To be fair to you we have given time to you to explain your case but instead of coming before the party disciplinary committee you have gone incommunicado. After your form was rejected by the authorities, BJP went ahead and got form of other eight candidates withdrawn. This has deprived people of Surat their voting rights," the Congress disciplinary committee headed by Balu Patel said.
"People of Surat and party workers have become very angry due to your action and are expressing their anger in different ways. The Congress party has decided to suspend you for six years from the party," the press note said.
Kumbhani's nomination form was rejected on April 21 after his three proposers submitted affidavits to the district returning officer claiming the signatures on the document was not theirs.
The nomination form of Suresh Padsala, the Congress' substitute candidate from Surat, was also invalidated on the same grounds.
In his order, Returning Officer Sourabh Pardhi said the three nomination forms submitted by Kumbhani and Padsala were rejected after prima facie discrepancy was found in the signatures of the proposers and they did not appear to be genuine.
Kumbhani, a former corporator from Surat, had unsuccessfully fought the 2022 Assembly polls from Kamrej there.
The Bharatiya Janata Party's Mukesh Dalal was elected unopposed from Surat Lok Sabha constituency on April 22 after all other nominees, including one from BSP, withdrew from the fray one by one on the last day of withdrawing papers.
