Former BJP MP Kirti Azad joins Congress ahead of LS polls

New Delhi: Former BJP MP and Lok Sabha member Kirti Azad, who was suspended from BJP in 2015, joined Congress on Monday in the presence of Congress President Rahul Gandhi ahead of the Lok Sabha elections.

 “Today in front of Shri Rahul Gandhi I joined the Congress. I felicitated him in traditional Mithila style,” Azad tweeted along with the photographs of him with the Congress president. Azad was to officially join the opposition party on Friday, but his induction into the party was postponed in the wake of the Pulwama terror attack.

A cricketer-turned-politician, Azad is currently serving his third term in the Lok Sabha, representing the Darbhanga constituency in Bihar. He worked with the ruling party for over two decades and had fought the 2014 general elections on a BJP ticket.

According to the sources, Kirti Azad is keen to contest from his home turf Darbhanga constituency, but the Congress may be more inclined to fielding the cricketer-turned-politician in Delhi.

On December 23, 2015, he got suspended from BJP for openly targeting Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley over alleged irregularities and corruption in Delhi and District Cricket Association (DDCA).

Azad is scheduled to hold a press conference at the AICC headquarters later on Monday.

Earlier, Azad had refused to disclose the party on whose symbol he would the fight the upcoming Lok Sabha polls.

Azad was a part of the World Cup Winning Indian Team in 1983.

He is the son of late Bhagwat Jha Azad, a veteran Congress leader who also served as the chief minister of Bihar for a brief period.