Bhopal: Former Odisha chief minister Ajit Jogi on Friday received a jolt with 40 workers of his newly-floated regional party switching over to the Congress.
Significantly, majority of 40 workers of Janata Congress Chhattisgarh (JCC), floated by Mr Jogi after he broke away from Congress two years ago, hailed from Bilashpur district’s Pendra area in Chhattisgarh, considered his bastion.
The activists joined Congress in presence of Congress Legislature Party (CLP) leader and Mr Jogi’s bête noir T.S. Singh.
“Forty workers of JCC joined Congress on Friday. This clearly indicates erosion of base of Mr Jogi in Pendra area,” a senior Congress leader from Chhattisgarh told this newspaper.
Incidentally, Mr Jogi’s wife Renu, a sitting Congress MLA, is currently representing Kota (ST) Assembly constituency and the couple’s son Amit, also a sitting MLA, has been elected from the neighbouring Marwahi (ST) Assembly seat in the last polls. Both the constituencies fall under Pendra region.
Mr Jogi’s son Amit, who was elected as a Congress candidate in 2013 Assembly elections, was expelled from the party a couple of years ago in the wake of the allegation of his involvement in the reported fixing of an Assembly by election in the state.
Mr Jogi, who was a Congress Working Committee (CWC) member, later formed his regional party.
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